EMS Delay Attributed to Dispatcher’s Error, Not CAD

Last May the city of New York made major changes in how it handles 911 calls, sparking complaints from the police, fire and EMS agencies about incorrect addresses, missing information and unit status errors. But the latest 12-minute EMS response delay involving the death of a 6 year-old boy appears not to be the fault of the new consolidated CAD system, but rather a dispatcher’s error. The Unified Call Taking (UCT) system was intended to merge 911 calltaking for all three agencies, instead of having each agency handle its own calls. Glitches in the systems geofile and other reference files has caused several problems, the city agrees. In the latest incident, a woman call to report her young son was unconscious, and gave her address in Manhattan.The woman was too hysterical to provide a cross street or other confirming location information, city officials say. The unnamed calltaker entered the incident, and since the location was duplicated in the borough of Brooklyn, a selection menu appeared. City officials say the dispatcher selected the Brooklyn version of the address, and EMS were dispatched there. Paramedics arrived to find nothing, and a dispatcher then telephoned the mother and learned of the correct location. Twelve minutes after the 911 call, an EMS unit arrived at the correct address to find the boy dead, apparently from a heart-related problem. The boy had been seen at a hospital the day before for virus-like symptoms, and officials aren’t certain the delay contributed to his death.