Alerting process?

[KnightRider]

I work in private EMS and work 24 hour shifts. Our building and the one where dispatch is in is separated by a parking lot. So, at night, the page will go to the trucks cell phone and the dispatcher will call in to sleeping quarters. Who ever answers the phone has to wake up the crew he wants to respond. So, everyone gets woke up or has their sleep disrupted to alert 1 crew. Its not like at my volunteer/part time fire dept where we have enough for a EMS or squad crew where dispatch tones us out, this is a constant thing and I feel like noises now get me anxious and find my sleep schedule screwed up while off duty.

Is there a better way of alerting a crew without bothering everyone else?

 

[Chris07]

I’m sure there are ways but they’re not nearly as cost effective.
We used to get toned out, the problem with tone outs is that the alert goes to every room, so you’d hear it even if it wasn’t yours to hear, not to mention the tone outs where you’d jump out of bed only to hear that you were an accidental tone out.

Welcome to 24s...where sleep is a lie and the points don’t count.

 

[DrParasite]

is there a better way? absolutely. Assign minitor pagers to every crew, and activate their tones only. might not help if you are all sleeping in the same open area, but it can help. But there is also a cost associated with this.

My first paid EMS job was in a crappy city, where we operated on the police dispatch frequency. So the dispatcher would call our radio unit on the air, and if they got no answer, they would call us at the station. you can imagine that after 11pm, we turned our radios off, because no one wanted to hear the PD BS all night long. So every time they would call, my ears would perk up: "do we have a call or was dispatch just asking a question?" But we were also paid to answer calls, not to sleep, so complaining to management fell on deaf ears.

not to mention the tone outs where you’d jump out of bed only to hear that you were an accidental tone out.

The first time this happens it's a mistake. If it happens again, me and the dispatcher are going to have words in the parking lot after his or her shift is over. And it won't be pretty.

Private EMS is historically cheap, where they will cut costs at the expense of personnel (in this case, crews getting sleep). Are there better ways? sure, but I wouldn't expect to see any changes any time soon.

 

[hometownmedic5]

There is always another way. The question becomes does your agency want to write the check. Without seeing the layout of your facility, I can't really get into specifics, but yes, for a lot of money, a system could be engineered to prevent you from losing sleep while you're employer is paying you. Go ahead and try to sell that one to the powers that be. If you were talking about improving performance, you might have a case, but it's unlikely this particular dog is going to hunt.

Keep in mind that things can always be worse. You could be in an SSM system where you're always in the truck roving from CSL to CSL like a shark. Your system might not be optimal, but it's better than many...

 

[Bullets]

I work in private EMS and work 24 hour shifts. Our building and the one where dispatch is in is separated by a parking lot. So, at night, the page will go to the trucks cell phone and the dispatcher will call in to sleeping quarters. Who ever answers the phone has to wake up the crew he wants to respond. So, everyone gets woke up or has their sleep disrupted to alert 1 crew. Its not like at my volunteer/part time fire dept where we have enough for a EMS or squad crew where dispatch tones us out, this is a constant thing and I feel like noises now get me anxious and find my sleep schedule screwed up while off duty.

Is there a better way of alerting a crew without bothering everyone else?

If the page goes to the trucks phone, the why do they also call the building? That seems unnecessary.

However, when i worked nights we had 2 trucks on. We just got straight paged. We would have to know who was up. If you werent, you just rolled over and went back to sleep.

The only way this could be better is if each truck had a tone, and the pager activated only on that tone. But then youre relying on dispatch to decide or keep track of the rotation, and honestly i wouldn't trust that. Unless you dived your first due into zones and assigned a truck to each, and then gave your dispatchers zone assignments at the beginning of each shift. This is what i do at my one job now.

The agency i run, both trucks are at the same building, so i trust my crews to divide the responses up fairly but also logically.

 

[Jim37F]

My last company had something like 20 stations spread throughout the county. Most had 2 units assigned (some had 3 and at least one station had 4 units). The company's method of station alerting? Landline telephone....dispatch would pick up their phone, but the speed dial of the station they wanted, a nice shrill ringing in the station till someone answered. There was a phone in each of the crews quarters and common areas....yup everyone woke up (even if still in bed eyes closed cuz your second up....right? Hopefully you didn't lose track...)

Before that I worked for a fire department as an ambulance operator (the title they gave to the single role EMTs). Professional station alert tones, with color coded lights (red for the engine co, green for the truck co, blue for the ambulance, etc) pre records and all that jazz....usually wasn't a problem since like 90% of the calls after night were medical amyway.....but same problem as earlier, the FD stopped spending just short of buying a system that could segregate areas in station (i.e. other departments have systems where if there's a medical, only the EMS dorms are alerted, vice versa if the engine had to deal with an alarm at midnight the EMS got a few more min of sleep till their next call......nope out dept the entire station got alerted 24/7 anytime any unit in station got a call. I remember one memorable night, I don't remember too many details, but I think it was like midnight-ish? Us on the ambulance had already hit double digits in calls that day, and we were exhausted, where it's almost painful to wake up again, especially for a call thats not ours....so the tones go out, waking us up...engine had a fire alarm to go reset somewhere....the lights will shut off in a couple seconds and I can squeeze in a bit more sleep....well the truck company decided to take the alarm for the engine...well policy was for dispatch to go thru the whole process from scratch, and since the truck was in quarters, that necessitated the tones to go off again BZZT! BZZT! BZZT! TRUCK RESPONSE! FIRE ALARM! (Prerecord now switches to PA of dispatch including the radio beeps:Beep Beep Beep! Truck 26, fire alarm, at blah blah blah...." yeah that sucked more than just a telephone ringing would've, regardless of how shrill Lol! (Though in all honesty, overall, I liked the FDs alert system better than the private co's.....Though both got the job done, and one was significantly cheaper than the other....

 

[KnightRider]

The reason they call the building is because some of the crews leave the cell phone (forget the model, its a flip phone with a PTT feature) on the truck or out in the dayroom so it is not always at the bed side. Some wouldnt hear it due to people changing the ring tone on it anyhow. They WILL hear the loud phone ringing (3 ringing at the same time, 1 in the day room and 2 in the bunk room) in though.We have 10 bunks in our sleeping quarters and you can count on 6-8 of those being filled each night. We have 6 ambulances and 6 ambulettes in our station.

Were not assigned zones or anything. Some dispatchers keep track of the runs to divide them up evenly but if you have less medics then basics on, and you have ALS calls, your medic truck will have calls stacked and will run hard. Other times, a crew might have to be split up for a period of time so an ambulette run can be handled if there are not enough of those drivers or the overnights where there are none. They do have their own software to keep track of the runs.

I wish each crew had their own room, call in there.lol. Ideally, the place needs rebuilt to combine both buildings in to one. The property is nearly 2 acres, most of it parking lot. Our crew area is 768 sq ft of dayroom/sleeping quarters and 3024 sq ft of ambulance bay. Sucks having to cross a lot in bad weather to turn paperwork in.

 

[DrParasite]

The reason they call the building is because some of the crews leave the cell phone (forget the model, its a flip phone with a PTT feature) on the truck or out in the dayroom so it is not always at the bed side. Some wouldnt hear it due to people changing the ring tone on it anyhow.

you know, it might be an over simplification, but it seems like the issue can he handled by requiring crews to keep their assigned cell phone with them at all times, and not changing the ring tone and volume so it always wakes them up. Make it a standard company policy, and if they fail to do it, progressive discipline.

 

[KnightRider]

The problem with that, and I forgot to mention this earlier, is that there is only one cell phone per truck. That phone gets passed around like a football between crew members and like other cell phones, the battery will die if you dont charge it. Those chargers are in dispatch and may not leave dispatch. So that is another reason a crew may not have it at the bedside. Otherwise, they may work.

 

[CALEMT]

(i.e. other departments have systems where if there's a medical, only the EMS dorms are alerted, vice versa if the engine had to deal with an alarm at midnight the EMS got a few more min of sleep till their next call

Where my buddy did his internship he described a system like this. You could individually program each room to the assigned unit you were on. i.e. if you're on the truck and the truck gets a call only the tones in the rooms that are selected for the truck go off. Same for the engine and squad. Really cool concept that eliminates hearing the unit thats getting called and rolling back over trying to fall asleep.

 

[Jim37F]

Where my buddy did his internship he described a system like this. You could individually program each room to the assigned unit you were on. i.e. if you're on the truck and the truck gets a call only the tones in the rooms that are selected for the truck go off. Same for the engine and squad. Really cool concept that eliminates hearing the unit thats getting called and rolling back over trying to fall asleep.

Yeah, that's the ideal for any station based agency with multiple units in station....but unfortunately, it seems to be a not very common thing IME. Like I said, even the ISO Class 1 Fire Department that spends money on fancy new tools (not that I'm complaining, when I was there it was awesome having brand new ambulances with MDTs and portable radios for each crew member, complete with the chargers in vehicle, etc etc) but even they didn't spring for such a system, not quite sure on the specifics of station alerting at the new gig (haven't quite gotten that far, still working on the basics in the academy haha) but I get the feeling it's a "whole station gets alerted for any one units call" deal as well.

 

[CALEMT]

but I get the feeling it's a "whole station gets alerted for any one units call" deal as well.

Its not so bad when you're the only unit at the station.

Whats bad is when you find out why the station is nicknamed night train.

 

[DrParasite]

The problem with that, and I forgot to mention this earlier, is that there is only one cell phone per truck. That phone gets passed around like a football between crew members and like other cell phones, the battery will die if you dont charge it. Those chargers are in dispatch and may not leave dispatch. So that is another reason a crew may not have it at the bedside. Otherwise, they may work.

These are regular cell phones right? nothing fancy about the chargers right? you know you can buy USB bricks and chargers for cheap right? a decent cable might cost you $2 each (monoprice.com is where I usually go, get a 28/24 AWG cable for faster charge times, pick whatever length you want), and you can get 20 USB bricks for $10 on ebay. Put one in every room, or issue it to the crews. see, problem solved. You call one person, and they are responsible for waking their partner. And if the crew doesn't answer the truck phone (for whatever reason), you can always call their personal phone (because you can't tell me that you have people who don't have cell phones in todays age). Either that or discipline the crew for going to sleep without a fully charged phone (extreme I know, but if that is the primary way dispatch is to contact them.....)

being an agency that relies on a communication system system that is guaranteed to run out of juice during a shift seems like just asking for problems. having crews use phones for 24 hours but requiring chargers to stay in dispatch sounds like a recipe for disaster. I'm a heavy phone user, and I know I can't go 8 hours without my battery dying. that's why I keep a charger in my laptop bag, a charger at my desk, a charger in my car, etc.....

 

[KnightRider]

I do not want to use my cell phone any more then I have to. There are times I have to use it for GPS. I had to raise my plan (which raises my bill) due to this to find facilities because this place doesnt have GPS systems in the trucks to help us. When I upgraded to iOS 11, my battery has never been the same.

I feel that supplying chargers will lead to a bad precedent. Dispactch wants these phones there. I feel if I supply chargers then nobody will have a reason to return them. Its a crappy situation. If we have tones, those tones would drop constantly. I just think this is all a no-win situation.

Thanks for the input everyone.

 

[hometownmedic5]

I do not want to use my cell phone any more then I have to. There are times I have to use it for GPS. I had to raise my plan (which raises my bill) due to this to find facilities because this place doesnt have GPS systems in the trucks to help us. When I upgraded to iOS 11, my battery has never been the same.

I feel that supplying chargers will lead to a bad precedent. Dispactch wants these phones there. I feel if I supply chargers then nobody will have a reason to return them. Its a crappy situation. If we have tones, those tones would drop constantly. I just think this is all a no-win situation.

Thanks for the input everyone.

I'd be willing to bet it would be financially advantageous to buy a stand alone GPS for work(and home) use than to pay an increased phone bill. The GPS you buy once and it works for years free of charge. The bill you'll pay every month.

 

[SpecialK]

It is far less common for a crew to be on-station now than it was; the old addage of station>job>station has been replaced with station>job>clear>cover move or redirection>job>repeat>end of shift.

If a crew is on station; for a high acuity response (lights and sirens) then Control tone call the station which sets off the station alarm and they also page the crew and verbally follow up over the air. For low acuity work it just goes down the pager. For mobile assignment it just goes down to the MDT

Being woken when the station is tone-called in the dead of night is not pleasant but it sure is effective

I can see a point in the not too distant future where the radio network and reliance on tone-calling is replaced by some form of cellular technology.

 

[Taylor]

Yea, just alert the responding crew. Why excite the enire room.

 

[DrParasite]

I do not want to use my cell phone any more then I have to. There are times I have to use it for GPS. I had to raise my plan (which raises my bill) due to this to find facilities because this place doesnt have GPS systems in the trucks to help us. When I upgraded to iOS 11, my battery has never been the same.

I agree with you in principle. using your personal phone for work stuff is generally frowned upon. but if it's either that or being disciplined or suspended/terminated for letting the truck phone die (which is the crew's responsibility, whether you like it or not), call my cell every time.

I feel that supplying chargers will lead to a bad precedent. Dispactch wants these phones there. I feel if I supply chargers then nobody will have a reason to return them. Its a crappy situation.

unused phones should be left in dispatch. this maintains proper accountability. When the crew goes off shift, they turn their phone into dispatch. If the crew is passing the phone off to another crew, then they have given them a phone with a dead battery, which serves no purpose.

Who cares what dispatch wants? they are staff, just like you. And they want the phones when they are not in use; it's not hard to require crews going off shift to turn their phones into dispatch.

What have you proposed to management? If the batteries on the phones are dying during your shift, buy more chargers. you have a problem, and now you have a cheap solution.

If we have tones, those tones would drop constantly. I just think this is all a no-win situation.

I think you are just whining. Solutions have been proposed, you want to make excuses. Many agencies do the same job as you, often with great success. They use multiple methods to notify their crews. Alert tones/pagers, alpha pagers, radio dispatch, calling the station, cell phone backup, they are all options. What makes you think your situation is that much different?

Thanks for the input everyone.

I have one more suggestion.... take all the crews, kick them out of the station, and force them to be in their trucks for 24 hours, or however long the shifts are. Put them on a street corner, so they can be predictably close to the next run. Tell them if they miss a call from dispatch, the first time it happens is a 7 day unpaid suspension; the second time is immediate termination. sounds like a really good incentive to stay away during the entire shift. And it solves all the problems you describe. you don't need to use your personal phone, you won't get woken up when everyone gets a call, and you will be able to respond to calls quicker, since you always know where your partner is.

I think you have been given plenty of great solutions....the fact that you don't like them shows that you don't want an actual solution, you just want to whine about a situation that could really be a lot worse.