# City Council intern passes out — and it takes EMS 30 minutes to respond



## DrParasite (Jul 18, 2013)

City Council intern passes out at press conference — and it takes EMS 30 minutes to respond 
When an intern for City Councilwoman Diana Reyna collapses, officials call 911 only to wait. Council Speaker Christine Quinn then phones NYPD Commissioner Raymond Kelly and calls the whole thing 'inexcusable.'






Photos by Aaron Showalter/New York Daily News; Jeff Bachner for New York Daily News

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york...nd-press-conf-article-1.1400008#ixzz2ZQgFqTwL


----------



## Rialaigh (Jul 18, 2013)

Dispatch system broke down, happens on  probably a daily basis in NYC, when your call volume is that high it happens...

Council Speaker Quinn ought to be reprimanded for calling the cell phone of the fire commissioner and calling the police commissioner and then speaking to the press about the incident before allowing it to be dealt with in house....



This will play out beautifully later when fire and ems officials ask for a budget increase to allow for better staffing and bring this news story back up with quotes...


----------



## EMDispatch (Jul 18, 2013)

The unified 911 system in NYC has kinks... Some very, very big kinks...

Unfortunately it's not the first nor last time something similar will happen. The biggest problem is the stunt pulled UFA President yesterday. http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/bronx/bronx-families-escape-early-morning-fire-article-1.1400955 

Nothing like completely undermining everything


----------



## mycrofft (Jul 19, 2013)

Rialaigh said:


> Dispatch system broke down, happens on  probably a daily basis in NYC, when your call volume is that high it happens...
> 
> Council Speaker Quinn ought to be reprimanded for calling the cell phone of the fire commissioner and calling the police commissioner and then speaking to the press about the incident before allowing it to be dealt with in house....
> 
> ...




Roger all of that.

They'll just budget 2 non-overtime positions (39 hrs or less a week, each) to staff a specifically-purchased, brand-new mobile ICU to attend all their meetings.

(And some pair of EMT's or paramedics will bite on those non-benefitted jobs, too.)


----------



## EMDispatch (Jul 19, 2013)

mycrofft said:


> Roger all of that.
> 
> They'll just budget 2 non-overtime positions (39 hrs or less a week, each) to staff a specifically-purchased, brand-new mobile ICU to attend all their meetings.
> 
> (And some pair of EMT's or paramedics will bite on those non-benefitted jobs, too.)



Why not staff it 24/7 with forced overtime?  That's how they're fixing the 911 system. We should all be working 80 hour weeks.


----------



## DrParasite (Jul 20, 2013)

Rialaigh said:


> Dispatch system broke down, happens on  probably a daily basis in NYC, when your call volume is that high it happens...


dispatch DID NOT break down.... there were no units avaiable for a low priority call.  If you have no units available for low priority calls, because you don't have enough units, this is what happens.  it wasn't a dispatch problem at all, it was a staffing for the EMS system that broke down.





Rialaigh said:


> Council Speaker Quinn ought to be reprimanded for calling the cell phone of the fire commissioner and calling the police commissioner and then speaking to the press about the incident before allowing it to be dealt with in house....


agreed.... you want to place a wager if that is going to happen?  I'd wager a weeks salary it doesn't happen, esp considering it wouldn't be the first time a politician opened their mouth about an incident without knowing all the facts, or without knowing all the details.





Rialaigh said:


> This will play out beautifully later when fire and ems officials ask for a budget increase to allow for better staffing and bring this news story back up with quotes...


Or maybe, when they ask for a budget increase, the article will justify why need need more money, to put more ambulances on the road to prevent extended responses just like this.


----------



## Farmer2DO (Jul 21, 2013)

DrParasite said:


> dispatch DID NOT break down.... there were no units avaiable for a low priority call.  If you have no units available for low priority calls, because you don't have enough units, this is what happens.  it wasn't a dispatch problem at all, it was a staffing for the EMS system that broke down.



You sure about that?

Why was this a low priority call? With two people calling 911, and the girl still unconscious, it seems like someone should have realized this was a higher priority job. Then, they created two different jobs. A commanding NYPD officer reports TWENTY MINUTES after the first 911 call that the girl is still unconscious. Still, no ambulance. Want to make a bet that the info never made it from NYPD to FDNY?

So, they don't get the correct info, causing it to be prioritized too low, and they create two different jobs, causing confusion. Then, a police officer confirms she still unconscious 20 minutes into it, but no one knows about it.

And you want to claim that this is an EMS problem?  Care to justify that?

This is a case where dispatch dropped the ball, time after time after time. Granted, the problems with dispatch are created by politicians and appointed government employees, but dispatch failed to gather the correct info, prioritize it correctly, and update the info when it should have been.

Major fail.


----------



## EMDispatch (Jul 21, 2013)

Patient was unconscious, but did the callers tell dispatch that???
We won't know until someone pulls a tape, but the fact that the article states the 2 different callers stated a sick and an injured person supports a possibility that they were never told. 

There was a hailstorm of balls falling out of the sky on this call... everyone shares some big blame on this, and until all facts are on the table we have no clue.


----------



## Farmer2DO (Jul 21, 2013)

My point is that it's the job of a 911 call taker to get that information. The NYC 911 system is horribly notorious for being inefficient, at best. It's a shambles. 

And as soon as the call was upgraded, a crew was assigned.

So I don't buy that this was an EMS problem at all.


----------



## Crackcicle (Jul 21, 2013)

My understanding is that she was NOT unconscious. It was, in fact, a sick call ad prioritized appropriately and the system was abused by the council member when she called it in, inappropriately in order to get a faster response, as an unconscious


----------



## EMDispatch (Jul 21, 2013)

Farmer2DO said:


> My point is that it's the job of a 911 call taker to get that information.


 
Even the best calltaker is only as good as the caller. They have to take their word for it.Which results in this...



Crackcicle said:


> My understanding is that she was NOT unconscious. It was, in fact, a sick call ad prioritized appropriately and the system was abused by the council member when she called it in, inappropriately in order to get a faster response, as an unconscious



NYC 911 has huge issues, without a doubt, but they're a great scapegoat.


----------



## Crackcicle (Jul 21, 2013)

EMDispatch said:


> NYC 911 has huge issues, without a doubt, but they're a great scapegoat.



That does seem to be our specialty. Politics at its best.


----------



## DrParasite (Jul 22, 2013)

Farmer2DO said:


> You sure about that?


No... I wasn't there, I have no first hand knowledge of the situation.  However, I am as educated on the situation as everyone else here, which is based on what the news is reporting.





Farmer2DO said:


> Why was this a low priority call? With two people calling 911, and the girl still unconscious, it seems like someone should have realized this was a higher priority job. Then, they created two different jobs.


according to the graphic above, there were two calls, one for a sick person, the other for a fall victim/injury.  Both of them are low priority calls, not life threatening.  Duplicate jobs happen all the time, especially when two people call at the same time for the same incident.  While this is annoying, a single ambulance will be still sent.





Farmer2DO said:


> A commanding NYPD officer reports TWENTY MINUTES after the first 911 call that the girl is still unconscious. Still, no ambulance. Want to make a bet that the info never made it from NYPD to FDNY?


not still unconscious; initial calls didn't say they were unconscious, only that the person fell or was sick.  Once EMS communications is advised the person is unconscious, the call is upgraded, and the truck and an ALS unit is sent.  Sounds like the dispatch center did their job, based on the informaiton they had.





Farmer2DO said:


> So, they don't get the correct info, causing it to be prioritized too low, and they create two different jobs, causing confusion. Then, a police officer confirms she still unconscious 20 minutes into it, but no one knows about it.


Garbage in, garbage out.  it was prioritized based on the information provided by the caller (which is the only way you can handle a call, based on the information you have), multiple simultaneous calls happen, and with different information you can get different calls, but they aren't that big of an issue to deal with.  And the police office didn't confirm still unconscious, he might have been the first person to report she was unconscious, and once it's updated at 1214 pm, an ambulance arrives 6 minutes later,  and more units arrive within 9 minutes of the updated information.





Farmer2DO said:


> And you want to claim that this is an EMS problem?  Care to justify that?


sure.  if there were more ambulances, than the low priority call would have gotten an ambulance sooner.  There were no ambulances available, and dispatch can only dispatch based on the information relayed to them.


Farmer2DO said:


> This is a case where dispatch dropped the ball, time after time after time. Granted, the problems with dispatch are created by politicians and appointed government employees, but dispatch failed to gather the correct info, prioritize it correctly, and update the info when it should have been.


No, it's not.  dispatch can only dispatch based on what they are told, and prioritize based on what the callers tell them based on how they answer the questions.  And once additional information was provided, it was upgraded appropriately.


Farmer2DO said:


> Major fail.


yes, on the EMS side.  Dispatch is being scapegoated for EMS not having enough units to handle the call volume.  NYC 911 might have it's issues, but I think they did their jobs appropriately in this case.





Crackcicle said:


> My understanding is that she was NOT unconscious. It was, in fact, a sick call ad prioritized appropriately and the system was abused by the council member when she called it in, inappropriately in order to get a faster response, as an unconscious


well, yes this would be the even bigger fail.


----------

