Big is beautiful??...... think of your health!!

Last night we were called to a lady who had fallen out of bed and needed assistance to get back into it again, nothing unusual we get calls like this often.... or so we thought, on arrival we were shown upstairs to an extremely cluttered room, our patient was a 70 year old, she was on her front, with her head and arms on the bed, in extreme respiratory distress, normally in these situations my crew mate and I would hoist our patient onto the bed and do some obs, checking first that there were no new pains anywhere, you'd be surprised what damage can be done falling from a bed!
In this instance it was going to be a little more tricky, as our patient, at a guess would tip the scales at about the 28 stones mark! my crew mate and I look at each other, " elk, second crew and fire service!" I suggest, he nods and goes to request the assistance and get the elk, an excellent piece of kit a flat square "mat which has 4 chambers which inflate to raise the patient to a sitting position, after doing a quick set of obs, I find her blood pressure, blood sugar level and temp. higher than I would like, which doesn't surprise me! with the arrival of the second ambulance, the four of us plus the patients son manage to "man handle" her onto the elk and begin to raise her to a sitting height, until one of the four chambers develops a leak!, using a canvas sheet with carry handles along its length we manage to haul her up onto a commode and wrap some blankets round her for dignity before the fire service arrive.
The fire fighters arrive and between us we decide that to get her out of the house and onto the ambulance, (she needed to attend hospital) we will have to carry her down the stairs, which are winding and narrow, on two carry sheets, as our carry chair will not be safe to use with this particular patient.
The bedroom, and front doors have had to be removed, (they were put back before the fire crew left) and within 15 minutes our patient was on the ambulance, we were on scene for over an hour and a half.
Big is not always beautiful, big usually means diabetes, ulcers, cardiac problems, breathing problems, cholesterol problems and hygiene issues to name a few things.
And then theres the stress and embarrassment when things like this happen, to mention nothing of our backs, and the financial issues.
the rest of the night was the usual types of jobs, none as taxing as this one.
(slimming world)