Unconventional
When the right thing is not in the protocol.
A minor crash, an Uber Eats order, and a decision that felt old school in the best way.
It was a winter night. Not a blizzard. Not a whiteout. Enough snow to make the roads slick and the stops longer. The kind of weather that makes everyone drive a little more cautious, until they don’t.
We got dispatched for a car accident. Two vehicles. Typical location. Typical radio traffic. We arrived to find what we expected. Two cars. One driver fine. The other driver upright, breathing, talking, and in obvious pain.
Nothing about it screamed advanced life support. No altered mental status. No respiratory distress. No bleeding you could see from the curb. It looked like a basic life support transport and an evaluation at the hospital. The problem was not the call.
The problem was the patient.
He did not want to go.
He sat there, bracing, guarded, trying to play it off. He kept looking down the street, then back at us, then at his car. Not denial. Not bravado. More like he was mentally trying to hold two problems at the same time.
My partner asked the simple question. What’s stopping you from getting checked out.
He hesitated. Then he said it.
He was an Uber Eats driver. He had a delivery in the car. The drop off was a block and a half away.
He didn’t say it like a joke. He said it like it mattered.
And it did.
In that moment, the call changed. Not clinically. Humanly.
My partner and I looked at each other. No speech. No debate. We both landed in the same place.
We told him this.
If you go with the BLS ambulance to get evaluated, we will finish the delivery.
He stared at us for a second like he didn’t trust what he heard. Then his shoulders dropped a little. He agreed.
The BLS crew arrived. We gave report. Mechanism. Complaint. Assessment. His reluctance. The deal. They loaded him up and headed for the hospital.
We took the food.
A block and a half are nothing. That’s the point. It was never about the distance. It was about the feeling of unfinished business. It was about being seen as a person trying to do his job on a bad night.
We walked up to the address and rang the bell.
The recipient opened the door and froze when he saw two EMS providers holding his bag.
We introduced ourselves and explained. Car accident. Driver being evaluated. He asked us to get this to you. We said we would.
Then the man laughed. Not at the driver. At the absurdity of life.
He told us Uber Eats had already called him. They said the driver was in an accident and his meal had been reordered and would be delivered.
So now he had two meals coming.
He shook his head and smiled. He thanked us. We wished him a good night.
Back in the fly car, we didn’t say much. We didn’t need to. It felt good to do the simple thing.
Author Bio
Mike Chanat is a veteran paramedic and leadership coach. He served with the NYPD and Locust Valley FD and is now a paramedic lieutenant at Rockland Paramedic Services. He teaches EMS leaders through his Key 3™ framework.
Mike, this is a powerful reminder that real leadership and service often show up in the smallest moments.
What stands out here is that you and your partner did not just assess the call, you saw the human being inside it.
The detail about the “unfinished business” hit hard, because so many people are carrying burdens nobody sees.
A block and a half may have been nothing physically, but professionally and personally it meant everything in that moment.
This is a great example of compassion, perspective, and doing the simple right thing when it matters most.