Which weapon is best for healthcare providers to carry?
If a provider in emergency medicine were permitted to have a concealed weapon on the job, what should it be? A handgun, expandable baton, pepper spray or a knife may be options, but I would like to share with you what I believe to be hands-down THE best one.
“Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet.” Maj. Gen. James Mattis Source
There my friends is a great example of the best concealed weapon. It is your mental preparation and your physical training that will allow YOU to be the best concealed weapon.
On the job in emergency medicine, I don’t think we need to take it to the level of planning to kill everyone we meet since we are not soldiers preparing for battle, but I do believe we should have a plan to defend against anyone at anytime. Stay with me here.
It all goes back to actual training. Proper training for you to be a concealed weapon in emergency medicine must have great customer service at the crux. It is the foundation of everything else. Showing empathy along with a non-judgmental attitude will help us appear neutral and non-threatening. Caring for people and treating “patients” is why we got into emergency medicine to begin with. Unfortunately for our culture in emergency medicine, some have allowed the pendulum to swing far in the opposite direction. Infecting perception of some… now instead of seeing everyone as a patient, they now see everyone as a criminal. The pendulum must rest in the middle. Allow a person’s behavior to reveal patient or not.
When you are “nice” and “professional” with your actions and words. The person you may have to defend yourself against is not able to readily spot your strengths or weaknesses. Your initial behaviors also set the stage with true patients, bystanders and family members who are present during your interactions. In effect, you are making witnesses out of all of them, good or bad.
While I can’t source it, someone I trained with said “The sword unseen delivers the fatal blow”. This immediately made sense to me in the self-defense realm. It is the equivalent of a professional fighter delivering strikes in combination. The strike the opponent never saw coming is the one that knocks them out.
Being a concealed weapon is like being a Rottweiler. The Rottweiler has a well deserved nickname, the devil dog. It is rumored the reason the Rotty got this nickname was due to it being a notoriously silent dog. Meaning it doesn’t do a lot of barking…It lets you in the house to pick up the flat screen TV, he just doesn’t let you leave with it. In contrast, take the Chihuahua. A tiny, sometimes lovable, rat on crack. The ankle biter that has to talk a ton of smack (barking) because it has not other weapon. So it tries to use its bark as a form of intimidation. The quiet, calm demeanor of the Rotty is the one to mimic, not that of the yapping Chihuahua.
When you present a calm and caring demeanor, while being prepared to reasonably defend yourself should you be attacked… you are in fact THE concealed weapon. Anything else you may have at your disposal (stick, knife, pepper spray or firearm) is nothing more than a tool for the weapon to use.
To put a DT4EMS twist on the quote from the general:
Be nice to everyone you meet, but plan to tap them twice. 🙂 Train with us, and you will get it 🙂
