Tuesday September 19, 2006

Blood Bike September 18th

I officially start duty on the blood bike at 7:00pm, however my first call came in at 2:10pm - a request to deliver catheter bags from a local hospital in Bridgwater to a nursing home. I do live a glamorous life don't I? I left the house at 7:30pm, just as my wife was serving dinner, by which time I had another call to deliver a CD-ROM contain scans from Musgrove Park Hospital in Taunton up to the intensive care unit at the Bristol Royal Infirmary. The duty coordinator suggested that I share this delivery so he dispatched our Bristol rider to meet me half way.

The delivery to the nursing home was difficult because it was located in an out of the way hamlet with no street lights, no road signs and roads so narrow and under-used that there was grass growing down the middle of them. To add to the difficulty it started raining. When I got there I was greeted by not one but four nurses all of whom wanted to see the bike and asked about the work we do - so there are some bonuses to the work!

When I handed over the second job to the Bristol rider, Martin, I discovered that this was his first ever call out for Freewheelers. We stopped and had a chat in the rain before he went on his way. I hope the weather doesn't put him off! Unlike Martin I was home drying off just 20 minutes later and waiting for the microwave to reheat my by now very cold dinner.

Time on the road: 2h20m, Mileage: 79, NHS money saved: £119 (US$224)

Posted by mikebelch ( Sep 19 2006, 08:24:58 AM BST ) Permalink Comments [0]