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04/12/2008
HOAX 999 CALLS COST LIVES - and an ambulance might not always be necessary
When the ambulance service receives a 999 call, it is treated as an emergency and the response is immediate. Unfortunately, when the ambulance arrives, the problem is not always serious or in some cases the call was a hoax.
When this happens response to genuine emergencies is delayed and, in the extreme, could cost a life. In Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire, South Central Ambulance Service NHS Trust (SCAS) received 105,067 calls in the year ended 30th June 2008. Of these 4,730 were either complete hoaxes or inappropriate. The latter included non-emergencies that could be dealt with by advice from NHS Direct; a visit to a GP; a hospital walk-in facility; or some other means. Although the proportion of such calls is low at 4.5%, it is still a significant waste of ambulance resources.
When a call is received at the operations centre SCAS aims to get a responder to the scene within eight minutes. This means that a fast car or an ambulance will travel as quickly as possible. Emergency vehicles with their blue lights and sirens making their way through traffic are familiar to everyone and, although trained to a very high driving standard, this is hazardous, both to ambulance crews and to other road users. If when the ambulance arrives the crew find that there is no emergency, their effort has been pointless and whilst all this is going on other patients may be suffering unnecessary delay.
SCAS does not want to discourage people from calling the ambulance service when there is a real emergency, but will work with the police to find those individuals who make hoax calls. In addition, SCAS has taken steps to cut the number of calls that do not require a fast response by using alternative methods of treating those patients who do not need to go to hospital. To assist ambulance crews there are now specialist emergency care practitioners who can give treatment to patients and also advice over the phone so that staff who control the dispatch of ambulances can decide on the degree of emergency when a call is received.
Examples of the type of inappropriate call received by SCAS include:
Patients’ complaining about having a minor cut on their finger which could easily be treated with a sticking plaster
Other inappropriate calls included a motorist who collided with a deer and was concerned for the animal’s welfare. He seemed surprised when told that the ambulance service only deals with human beings.
