Life is short and death is inevitable, two rules to live by. We're often told when it's your time, it's your time, so don't be scared but... what if we could hold off on that expiration date by just being smarter and healthier? EMS workers see death and tragedy all of the time and they admit, a significant amount of pain is highly avoidable just by realizing human error.
Redditor u/WapitiTal wanted to hear from some of our medical heroes who are hard at it in the field by asking.... EMS workers of reddit, what's the most avoidable death you've ever seen?
Slippery when Wet.
Not completely sure if I'm interpreting this right but people who take off their medical alarm (well known brand life alert) to shower. It seems like half the dead bodies I go on have a medical alarm but they took it off and slipped in the shower or while getting out. Those things are usually water resistant and that's an extremely common place to slip and fall. thereWasAnAttempt42
Drive Smart.
Probably anytime someone could have worn a seat belt but didn't. itfosho
Totaled my car a couple weeks ago. Without my seatbelt I would've gone through the windshield. As it was, I hit the airbag hard enough to pop it and spiderweb out the windshield in front of the wheel.
All in all, I got out with a couple friction burns on the inside of my forearms. Everything on the passenger side was shoved back about a foot or so.
Ps. State Farm "Emergency" Roadside Assistance was over 4 hours late to dispatch a driver, even after I called, cancelled with the automated system AND a phone operator. G_E_I_R_A_V_O_R
Take your Health Seriously.
When patients don't take their medicine. Lots of type 2 diabetics don't take their Metformin or change their diet/exercise simply out of denial or they are too set in their ways. End up with bad kidney failure or heart problems.
Additionally, had a patient who refused to take their medicine for their high blood pressure. No reason, just refused. Ended up with a brain bleed on his brain stem, was a quadripeligic, on a ventilator, could not speak, move, or breathe on his own.... he was in his 30s.
Take your medicine people. shocked_caribou
Smoke Away.
As an ER MD:
Me: Sir, you are having a heart attack. The cardiologist will be here shortly, and we will be taking you to the cath lab as soon as we can.
Patient: I'm going outside to smoke.
Patient rips off ecg leads and defib pads. Walks out despite warnings from myself and others.
EMS Radio (15mins later): XXX year old male cardiac arrest. CPR in progress. AndyEMD
Don't Wait!
It's hard to narrow it down to a specific one but I assure you it involves family that said "we just wanted to wait and see what happened." medic8388
Broken Bones.
I used to be an ambulance officer and on the job it was suicides. I had a guy slash his forearms with a knife then realize he didn't want to go through with it... we got half way to the hospital roughly before he checked out. The most avoidable death I've seen was my grandmother though she went to hospital with a broken wrist. She then developed a Staph infection which meant a couple of days stay supposedly, the orderlies then dropped her while moving beds and broke her hip which then lead to her getting pneumonia and her subsequent death. From a healthy 69 year old woman with a broken wrist to dead in a bit over a week. tungstenfish
The Simple Bleed?
Guy had a simple rectal bleed (eg fissure or tear in colon or intestine, blood comes out the anus). He got out of bed and tried to clean it up in the bathroom. That didn't help so he sat on the toilet and tried to stop it. That didn't help and it was getting messy so he went had a shower. Still didn't help so he went out into the bathroom and at that point, probably weak, he sat down in the ground and tried to wipe it up with toilet paper.
We found him dead, stiff with rigor mortis the next morning. Cell phone on the bathroom counter.
It was all pretty obvious from the trail of blood and bloody hand stains on the doorknobs, mirror, walls, toilet, shower knobs, floor... everywhere.
Folks, if you are bleeding a lot out of your butt, there is nothing you can do to stop it and your priority isn't cleaning it up. It's embarrassing but isn't worth dying over. Pjpjpjpjpj
In times of War.
I was an Army combat medic (EMT-B). The worst completely avoidable death was when we got a call that an Afghan soldier nearby was having chest pains, and their own medic was really concerned about it, so they sent him to our base.
On the drive over, their convoy had to stop suddenly. One of the guys riding in the back of a pickup truck fell off the back because he wasn't wearing any kind of seatbelt or harness. He probably would have been okay, but the truck behind them wasn't able to stop as quickly, so he got caught between the two. He probably would have survived, but he wasn't wearing his helmet either. His skull popped like a grape.
Of course, in my opinion, 100% of the deaths I saw were completely avoidable. Especially because after nearly two decades of war, the US military pulled out and the Taliban immediately retook the area. Men, women, children, and my brothers died for nothing.
Oh, by the way, the chest pain guy was completely fine. There was absolutely nothing wrong with him. Lovebot_AI
Sobriety First.
Drunk drivers. Way to many drunk drivers and the poor souls unlucky enough to be in their path. andrewdmc
Drunk driver killed my first husband. Drunk drivers are scum. So avoidable. I don't understand how people who rack up multiple DWI's aren't in prison. NiDonnaNaiz
Leave the Stickies!
Person in the hospital kept taking their EKG leads off because they didn't like the stickers on their chest. They kept doing this after being warned.
Had a heart attack and didn't get found until they couldn't be saved. Keep your damn leads on people. Bird_of_the_Word
Save your Blood!
I had a 32M admitted for multiple pulmonary embolisms, turns out this was his second admission within 2 months because he stopped taking his anti-coagulant that was prescribed during his previous admission. His reasoning? They didn't feel like they were doing anything so he stopped taking them. Due to this, he was then started on a different anti-coagulant that requires weekly blood tests, so instead of just taking a pill with little follow-up he had to live with weekly blood tests and a higher risk medication! toolate4ogusername
Can you Hear Me Know?
Not answering the phone is common, family will call for a welfare check. Sometimes a family member comes to visit. Old people also do this in assisted living and nursing homes but in my experience those rarely result in death. thereWasAnAttempt42
Nothing is Obvious.
Obvious answer would be all of the overdoses but also many incidents in nursing homes, where a patient will be found dead and the staff state "they just saw them 30 minutes ago" when that is definitely not the case.
The worse is a parent rolling onto their baby while asleep, I haven't had that call yet but other crews did recently and it is just devastating to all involved... family, medics, police, fire.... everyone. FuzzyMeep7
Never Go Back!
Was an EMT, but this was prior to that when I was just a Volunteer Firefighter... got called to a house fire when a grandmother had woken up her grand daughter and got safely out of the house. Unfortunately she decided to go back into the house and died of smoke inhalation mere feet from the door. Since it was a ways out in the county by the time we got there, the house was fully involved, meaning we couldn't go in had to fight the fire back to get through the door. Moral of the story, don't go back into a building in fire where everyone is out safe, things can be replaced but you can't. moderndaygypsy13
Unlucky.
Guy stationed on a coast guard ship got hit in the head by a crane when it fell over. The crane operator didn't put down the outriggers (the big metal feet that stick out to stabilize the crane) and it fell over. Victim was in the wrong place at the wrong time, left behind four daughters and a wife. SpyingForTheNSA
Jackhammer.
Dude caused massive internal bleeding from using a jack hammer incorrectly. By the time his wife called 911, he was all but dead, and had filled several small trashcans with blood he had vomited.
Big guy too. Had to use firemen and the sling to get him down the stairs. The whole time we were working on him and getting him down the stairs, his wife was nagging him about not hiring someone to break up the pavement, that he was such an idiot for trying to do it himself. She didn't know these were the last words he'd hear from her. nitewake
Too Much To Bare...
Not an EMS but my friend died of AIDS because he "got tired of" taking his medication. He was born with it and was always a little crazy in an offbeat kinda way. Our friend group never knew he was sick until he got hospitalized. Even then, we didn't know anything but he had pneumonia. When I went to see him his spine was visible and he kept telling us how they'd give him anything for pain, whenever he asked, which we all laughed at. He died a month later, laughing til the last day. He expressed regret at having stopped his drugs. His girlfriend, who he'd infected, was devastated as they'd just had twins. He had watched his mom die from it. Completely avoidable death. SexceptableIncredibl
I Know THAT Look!
I've posted this before but I once had a patient who had "the look" of someone with one foot in the grave who had near complete blockages in all three of the main blood vessels that supply the heart. That's not super unusual, and with open heart surgery she probably had an excellent chance of a good outcome. What was different about this case was she had apparently she'd had the same thing happen (to slightly less degrees) not once, not twice, but THREE times over the previous six months and had refused surgery each time in favor of a Mediterranean diet.
She decompensated very quickly, was immediately sedated and intubated, and flown out to the big city hospital for the surgery she should have received six months ago. I'm pretty sure she did survive, but did not have a great quality of life. ggrnw27
Hair Back.
Not EMS, but in my lab at school they talked about safety in the lab and shared how there was this girl who was in a lab with lathes (operated by spinning) and her hair was long and got caught in the machine and pulled her to it and she died. Must wear a bun in those labs, not even a pony tail will do you good. bluesapphire731
Don't be Dumb.
People doing dumb things on the job. Moving an industrial generator? Sure, stand directly under it while the Loft is lowering it down. Have a truck load of 7,500 pound i-beams that need to be offloaded off a flatbed? Sure thing, do it by yourself with a forklift. Have a wood planer at a furniture factory that gets jammed? Go ahead, stick your arm in there to unjam it. IndWrist
If you or someone you know is struggling, you can contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255).
To find help outside the United States, the International Association for Suicide Prevention has resources available at https://www.iasp.info/resources/Crisis_Centres/
When it comes to electing a leader, the choice is an easy one if a potential candidate shares the same values as yours.
And while a candidate is fit to lead remains to be seen, we rely on our instinct to choose someone with whom we can relate.
But sometimes, our options are limited and we inevitably go with someone who is the lesser of two evils.
Curious to hear from strangers online about a hypothetical, Redditor Cashmeresquid2309 asked:
"Americans of Reddit, would you vote for an openly Atheist presidential candidate? Why or why not?"

Redditors were quick to point out the answer was a no-brainer.
We Already Know The Answer
"Asking Reddit if they'd vote for an atheist..."
"I feel like the answer would be obvious."
– sarahmagoo
Sci-Fi Analogy
"Americans of Reddit, would you vote for a Star Wars fan who heckin loves doggos?"
– WitnessChemical
For The Atheists In The Crowd
"Atheists of atheistville, would you vote for an open atheist?"
– nixcamic
Others weighed in with a range of opinions.
About 45
"What's funny is how many of them would probably say no, even though they voted for Trump and would do so again. Say whatever else you want about him, but I seriously can't understand how anyone could genuinely believe Trump is a Christian. He's so obviously faking it and is undoubtedly the most atheistic president we've ever had or are likely to have for a long time."
"This is a guy who's never even so much as read the Bible or attended church, who told a conservative radio host his favorite Bible verse was 'an eye for an eye', who told evangelical interviewers that he's never asked God for forgiveness because he's never done anything wrong, and who routinely commits all 7 deadly sins (pride, greed, wrath, envy, lust, gluttony and sloth) without remorse."
– empfindsamkeit
From A Different Perspective
"Not an american but interestingly according to this survey on 1006 people from 2007, being atheist was the worst thing you could be as a candidate (of the things asked) with only 45 % of people saying they'd vote for one."
– ilovecatfish
An atheist candidate isn't necessarily a big strike.
Double Negative
"I wouldn’t not vote for someone just because they were atheist."
– HabitualEnthusiast
Credibility First
"This is it. If they’re running on platforms I support with a history to back up those campaign promises, I don’t care if they belong to the church of the flying spaghetti monster. They could literally be a member of the satanic temple and I, an actual practicing Christian, would give less shi*s than a constipated sloth."
"Edit: yes, I realize the Satanic Temple does not actually worship satan. I used it for that purpose. The Church of Satan has some…problematic views and I probably would not vote for someone who literally holds a platform of eugenics."
– Phoenix_of_Asclepius
Some view the role of religion in politics as important.
It Depends
"Religion can be relevant: I would have strong reservations about voting for a Scientologist, even if I agreed with the policies they proposed. I would have strong reservations voting for a member of an apocalyptic cult or, possibly worse, a follower of the (highly heretical) 'prosperity gospel,' which unfortunately includes more and more so-called 'evangelicals' — I didn't vote for George W. Bush, but it's not because he was an evangelical."
"It depends on the role: I'd probably be more flexible with a legislator than an executive (mayor, governor, president), as their character is IMO more important than for a legislator and their policy stances somewhat less important relative to a legislator."
"Satanic temple — well, that's just an organized group of atheists and humanists with an intentionally inflammatory choice of name. They're generally fine people."
– alyssasaccount
A Bad Rap
"The Satanic Temple is an excellent organization that every decent person should be able to respect. A Church of Satan member, not so much."
"There's a huge difference between them!"
– StarsEatArtBooks
And Redditor boganvegan said it best.
"Better an open atheist than a fake Christian."
It all boils down to trustworthiness. Without full transparency, how could anyone put their faith in a candidate who spews nothing but lies?
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Being home alone isn't always the most tranquil thing.
No one is there to help or protect you.
And things that go "bump" in the night... sometimes they do more than bump.
Redditor ag9910 wanted to hear about the times home felt like an unsafe place to be. They asked:
"What is the scariest, strangest, most unexplainable thing that has happened to you while home alone?"
I'm always freaked out when I'm home alone. Lights on. Yeah, my electric bill is high.
Dorothy?
"I dreamed the front door blew open at the exact time the house alarm went off... I hopped up and sure enough, the front door was open. No intruder."
fatowl
I See You
"Not home alone but only one in right side of the house. Went to my mom's bathroom to wash my hands and saw a pair of feet behind the half open door. Laughed and said 'very funny Ma, I see you.' then finished up and left. Bumped into my mother in the kitchen unpacking, nobody else was in the house. I'm glad whatever was behind the door didn't peek out."
SatanWithFur
“It’s Doug!”
"One night I had forgotten to lock my apartment door and woke up in the middle of the night. My bedroom door was about 2 feet from my front door, as you walked into the apartment. First a big dog ran by, then a person. Holy crap I was so scared and I screeched 'Who is it?!?!!'"
"A man said 'It’s Doug!' As I was thinking to myself, who the f**k is Doug, he said 'oh, crap.' He turned around to go back out the front door saying 'Sorry.' I asked 'Didn’t you have a dog with you?' He said 'Oh, yeah. Hey, c’mon!.' He left, his dog ran out after him and I locked my front door."
"Edit: glad you all thought this was funny, because I did too, once my heart quit trying to beat right out of my chest! The next day the girls at work thought I was crazy for not being upset, but eh, done is done. Peace!"
scarletohairy
Confused...
"My sister and I were home alone and we heard someone big running up the stairs. The stairs make lots of noise with slight pressure so when there’s someone big on them you can tell. I went out of my room to check but saw no one anywhere and my sister also came out of her room and she asked if that was me I said no and we both looked around to see if there was anyone but found no one in the whole house. We were confused and called our parents and just waited until they got back and that was that."
JtSudbury04
I See You
"I very clearly saw a guy walk into my room. But when I went after him there was nobody there. I checked in the closet, under my bed, everywhere one could hide in my room."
HighlyOffensive10
This is why home video surveillance is key.
"NO"
"My parents were on a road trip, just left, and I sat down at my desk. I thought 'Weekend alone by myself' and a voice yelled into my right ear 'NO' so loud it hurt."
Th4ab
Wild
"I managed to lock myself out of my house on my birthday during a tornado while trying to bring my cats to the basement for safety. I later found out that the tornado was approximately a couple miles or less from me at that exact time. The sky was green and it got weirdly calm and then I could hear what sounded like a train coming before I found an unlocked window to climb through. Wild times."
SilverGnarwhal
Saturday morning in the 80s...
"I wasn't home alone but I was awake by myself one Saturday morning in the 80s when I was around 7 or so. I believe my mom was the only one home because my dad went to the lake to go fishing that weekend, and I'm not sure where my older brothers were, maybe they went with him, idk."
"Anyways, my mom's sleeping in, and I'm in the living room by myself, watching Saturday morning cartoons and making a fort out of sheets and cushions. Something made me turn around and I saw my dad in his pajamas standing in the hallway entrance with his hands on his hips, looking the mess I was making and shaking his head."
"He then turned around and walked into my room, which was just off the hallway entrance. Dude. I didn't even look, I just booked it to my parents room and woke my mom up. I don't remember what happened after that, this was around 35 years ago. And yes, my dad was fine, nothing had happened to him."
smriversong
Get the Bat...
"I was at home by myself on a call with some friends when all of a sudden my dog begins to bark like crazy, which was odd since it was the middle of the night and he's usually sleep. I go downstairs to check on him and find him barking at our hall closet, terrified I grabbed my bat that I keep in my room just in case and open the door. There was nothing out of usual at first at then I look down and notice a familiar looking object at the bottom of the closet."
"It was my mom's necklace she had lost when I was 9, (i'm 15 now just to put in perspective how long it's been). I showed it to my mom at breakfast and she was just as shocked as I was. I still have no clue how it got there or how my dog knew it was in there, definitely one of the oddest occurrences of my life."
SomeRandomIdiot14
Meow
"Many years ago, I was 14 or so, my first night alone in the house when my parents were out. Lying on the living room floor reading, my cat sleeping next to me."
"Suddenly, cat wakes up, stares intently into the dark corner of the room behind me, hair on end, growls and then bolts out of the room and upstairs. I look behind me and see nothing, but follow cat upstairs and hide under the covers. Freaked me out."
LairdofWingHaven
Thank God for alarms. I hate being home alone.
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The human body is still such a mystery.
How much do we really know?
Not a lot apparently. We're learning more all the time.
And most of it is gross.
Redditor BathNo7713 wanted to discuss the ick factor of anatomy. So they asked:
"What is the most disturbing fact about the human body?"
The body freaks me out. But it's all I've got. So teach me some things.
Minutes...
"The fastest killing virus takes around 4 days to kill you. That would be Ebola. Your immune system can kill you in 15 minutes."
will477
'locked-in'
"If your brainstem (the part of the brain that mediates most motor control for all of the body) is damaged, you can get 'locked-in' syndrome. That means you're fully conscious and aware of your surroundings but unable to move or speak. The only muscles that remain unaffected in most people are the muscles that move they eyes and the eyelids."
"You're essentially trapped within your own body with your only way of communication being blinking or moving your eyes It can be caused by toxins, blockage of the basilar artery which is the main artery of the brainstem, or other brainstem damage."
4oodler
Explosions
"Some people suffer from Exploding Head Syndrome, which causes them to hear a loud bang when they wake up."
ToraMix19
"When I was younger I believe I experienced this a few times. Sounds I heard were: about a million people talking and laughing all at once, a train that irl would've been about a foot away from me based on the volume of the sound, and a door slamming loudly."
aliaisacreature
Pain
"Not sure if this is by design, but I totaled my car once, almost completely uninjured somehow. Then I looked down to my right hand which I remember jabbing into my dashboard at 55mph. Luckily (unluckily?) only my pinky took the blow. But instead of a floppy-udder full of bone-sand, my pinky was 0.5 inches long."
"Broke no bones, but instead perfectly stacked my phalanges, or finger bones, INTO my hand. This is fixed by a muscular Russian murse grabbing your pinky with both hands and pulling very hard. God I wish they gave me more lidocaine."
TelevisionOlympics
Functions
"If you have a surgery where they need to move your organs around they might not function for a day as the body assumes that they are dead."
tonythebutcher13
Move things around? You mean that's not fake when it happens on "Grey's Anatomy?"
"The only reason you are not aware of it is because the ambient noise kind of drowns it out because your ears focus on it. If you go to one of those super-silent rooms that absorb all sorts of sounds, it is a really weird way to reacquaint yourself with your body."
Black_Handkerchief
The Mouth
"Idk about the most disturbing but how bad human teeth are. We’d think it’s our sugary and processed diets these days that cause it, but even Otzi the iceman discovered in Italy was found to have terrible teeth, mouth diseases and cavities. It’s odd that even with the most basic of diets our teeth are so bad."
Dorianisconfused
In the bowels...
"I noticed this after my abdominal surgery. When I turned over in bed my guts seemed to fall from one side to the other. Mentioned to my doc and she confirmed it was my bowels rearranging themselves."
squatter_
"Apparently the doctor just throws your intestines back in there higgeldy-piggeldy because there isn't a correct way to pack them neatly."
LostDesigner9
A Quick Burst
"There are a vast number of ways that your body can malfunction and kill you with little or no warning. An aneurysm can go undetected until it bursts and kills you. Getting hit in the chest just the right way can stop your heart. You can encounter an allergen that never previously provoked an immune response that freaks out your body so badly that you die. You literally just never know if your body will just... die."
Unsolicited_Spiders
The body is such a conundrum. Sexy and gross all at once.
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Being overweight comes with numerous challenges.
And not only challenge's to one's health.
Unfortunately, overweight people are far too often a target for judgment and ridicule, often owing to misconceptions.
Even worse, sometimes simply being bigger than other people leads others to assume that they must also be less than or inadequate in general.
Redditor Rude_Guarantee_1479 was curious to hear what people felt is the worst part, or most common misconception about being overweight, leading them to ask:
"What is the worst part about being a fat person?"
Since I'm fat, I must also be stupid.
"For some reason people always assumed I was simple minded/stupid when I was obese."
"Now that I've lost weight people just talk to me like I'm a regular person."- batyablueberry.
No comfort to be had.
"Feeling uncomfortable all the time."- Keithninety.
Not being seen and always being noticed.
"I have a fear that nobody is ever going to fall in love with me because I don't feel visible and I am fat
Also, going to the pool or beach and you have to put on a swimsuit. I feel like a seal stranded on the beach.- mango_0111.
Inadequate clothes.
"My belt trying to stab me in my belly when I sit down."- jimjohn2017.
"Nothing seems to fit nicely or still look nice in your size."- OutlandishnessNo1950.
"The amount of pants you go through."- Cmonredditalready.
"Putting on a shirt, walking into the backroom, seeing how it makes me look, and then never pulling out my favorite shirt ever again."- YeaItsaThrowaway112.
Never feeling good about yourself.
"Feeling guilty while eating your favorite foods, not looking good in photos/clothes."- pissed_at_everything.
Mobility challenges.
"My thighs rubbing and chaffing."
"I'm so raw right now."- HeavyBreathin.
Unwanted nicknames.
"Not the worst part, but the most constantly sh*tty part is constantly being called 'big guy' by every kind of person other than other 'big guys'."- Professor-ish.
As the old saying goes, true beauty comes from within.
And the way someone looks should never be one's first impression.
Nor does anyone need to go through the day facing unwanted judgment when simply walking down the street.
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