We have a couple Fire/EMTs at our dept. Everyone else is first responder certified. I'm looking to get my paramedic next year. Its all tough work, but somebodys gotta do it
In my area (Chicago suburbs), we're all Firefighter/EMT-B or Firefighter/EMT-P. It's really apples and oranges to try to compare the two in my opinion though. Stay safe!
I do both, I'm a Fire Medic. It depends on the call, sometimes fire, sometimes medical? Over all, I Think its pretty close. Maybe being a paramedic might be a little more stressful, because you can make a choice of treatment or not treat in time. Your always dealing with a Pt on medical calls, not all the time on fire calls. Things could get bad pretty fast on medical and trauma calls. Dealing with family members, children, things like that. Runnin a call on children, always makes your butt pucker as a medic, I don't care how long you've been doing it.
I agree with you KIT. There really isn't anything more frightening than having a patient loaded into the ambulance breathing and before you get to the EC, they are not breathing. Makes for a tense fifteen minutes!
I work as a FF/Paramedic and both can be stressful at times. We do however respond to more medicals then fire calls. On a rare occasion we have more fire calls and I laugh with the crew and say "Hey, we are like real firefighters today!"