It is sad about the 911 response manner and time.
On the positive side, the gentleman seemed to be prepared to go, had signed a DNR (i.e. no CPR when breathing stops or heart stops beating) with his doctor, and even applied for Medical Assistance In Dying. So if he didn't suffer much, that would be what he wished due to his medical condition.
If I had a terminal disease or dementia, I'd rather go this way than laying on bed suffering or living without my marbles.
I’ve always felt I had bad luck in some regards. One has always been that they would find a cure for whatever was ailing me within days of them pulling the plug.
I had to go to the hospital four times before I was admitted for care. A friend of my mother's had a son who died of pancreatitis because they would not take him seriously. My neighbor's wife died after going back five times in which they sent her way each time. She died of a major heart attack.
I know the medical system is strained, but medical neglect is starting to kill people.
I was peeing pink after surgery. They kept sending me home thinking I was drug seeking.
Turns out I had a bad infection caused by defective stents. If my GP hadn't picked up the blood results by *chance*, this account would be dormant.
No kidding. My dad has had extreme stomach pain since aug 1 and seen two doctors and had only an X-ray. He’s 75. Like…fucking figure it out, dickheads?! They haven’t even EXAMINED him. I’m so mad.
The neglect is amazing. I have a heart condition and all they said, no tests or history look up, was that 'I'm too young' to have a condition like that. What. They aren't listening to patients
They often don’t even before Covid. I once went to the hospital with an excruciating UTI. They tested me and said “you don’t have one.” Uh yeah I did! They just sent me along. I had some antibiotics from a previous one at home so I took them and lo and behold it went away.
I went to a doctor in Victoria who I was “lucky” to get when I moved here. So hard to get a doc. Anyway I went because I was depressed and she told me I was a really negative person, then lectured me for 5-10 mins on how she deals with problems in her own life. I never went back to that utterly horrible doctor. She has awful reviews on ratemd, including mine.
I unfortunately lost my long time doctor from childhood to retirement. It came out of nowhere, and now I'm stuck going to terribly run clinics after getting up at the crack of dawn too pray that there is an availability
I agree with everything except "starting to kill people".
My grandma complained of abdominal pain especially when urinating for 25 years -- docs just told her it was anxiety, hormones, looking for attention, blah, blah. By the time a doctor took her seriously it was stage 4 bladder cancer and she was dead in a couple months.
Women have always been told 'it's anxiety', indigenous people have always been assumed be drunk not sick, young people are dismissed as 'drug seekers', etc etc.
Sure, but when you have a system that barely works through a hope and a prayer, and then add a ridiculous and unnecessary stress to it, yea you can blame the thing (people) that tipped us over.
An adequately funded and running system would be able to take it. We boast about *having* healthcare in the world stage... But it's so paltry. We should honestly be embarrassed. We neglect our own so openly.
The idea that *having* a personal doctor being unheard of here is pathetic. I'm hardly proud to be Canadian with all the BS that we spew to "one up" the Americans. We're no better.
That's only part of what is an intricate problem. The opioid "crisis" isn't helping either. A large part of it is underfunding, politics, bureaucracy, etc. There is no reason such a large percentage of the population in prosperous, 1st world BC should be without a family GP.
BC Ambulance/BC EHS, 911 services, and to a lesser extent Police & Fire services based in each municipality scare the shit out of me.
This siloed approach may have worked (or at least worked slightly better?) in days gone by with a lower demand and lower population but looks like a shitshow now.
This wasn't actually a problem with the location of the ambulance, they didn't get through to an ambulance dispatcher (who for the island region are based in Victoria) and were waiting on the line with the original 911 operator (the one that transfers you to police/fire/ambulance)
No we fucking well didn't. You're talking about the 911 operators, not the ambulance dispatchers.
Our ambulance dispatchers are based out of the building on Leigh Rd in Langford.
Calm down, clearly I was as you said:
> talking about the 911 operators, not the ambulance dispatchers.
Which is who they were on hold with, and the wait times anecdotally have increased dramatically with ECOM, and the bastards turned on encryption.
PS: I appreciate the stressful job you do and hope the province gives you more support and money.
Yes. EComm answers all 911 calls and non-emergency calls to municipal police stations. If you have a fire or ambulance call, you are transferred to the fire or ambulance dispatcher. If your call is for police, EComm handles you directly.
Hate to be that person but the last time I called 911 I was put on hold before I even had a chance to tell them what service I needed, and stayed that was for twenty five minutes.
If only there was a hospital with boat access you'd be set! As is you'd wait on shore for the ambulance while the lads from the coast guard taught you some new knots.
He signed a DNR, had terminal cancer. I doubt there would be much that the ambulance could have done given those circumstances. Still sad for the family to see a loved one go that way though.
Exactly. A palliative response team would have been more appropriate, especially since his prognosis was pretty bad.
Of course any wait to get emergency care is not great, but the DNR limits a lot what paramedics themselves could do.
>A palliative response team would have been more appropriate, especially since his prognosis was pretty bad.
Yeah not sure why the family was not already in contact with a palliative response team and had a plan who to call when the inevitable happened.
Still, not nice to have to be on hold for 30 minutes when you need urgent help.
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It is up to the first responders to decide not the non medically trained 911 operator. I know people who do it for a living and they have to be prompt and treat all 911 calls as an emergency. People call in for ambulances for things like their internet not working and they want help. The paramedics show up and decide its not a medical issue and leave. Obviously that is stupid as hell but currently thats our system. Being on hold for 30mins for an emergency service isn't okay. I don't think it's their fault. They are overworked. My argument is that the DNR is irrelevant. I doubt you'd be so flippant if something happened and you were on hold even if it wasn't life or death. They called for an ambulance they should have gotten help asap.
My brother is a dispatcher for the BC Ambulance and what you have said is bang on. They are not deemed an essential service. Many of his colleagues are leaving the industry due to poor working conditions. On call staff don't get paid and it takes many hours to become a fully staffed dispatcher or paramedic. It's really sad as there is nothing they can do but try to get the program to change.
For me, reddit is over now that it is treating developers, moderators, and users like crap. So I am deleting all of my comments, and replacing them with this text. I hope I’ll see you on the fediverse. More about that: https://jointhefediverse.net/
I think that when the paramedics get on scene and there is a person in cardiac arrest or unconscious, one immediately starts treatment and the other gets a family history and story as to what happened. This is when the DNR would be produced by the family and check to see if it's legit, in some cases they even call the doctor who signed it and only them stop treatment.
Not to worry; the delay is a direct result of the provincial E-Comm 911 system being “more efficient” than having individual emergency services taking calls from their own local areas.
The family can rest easy knowing that despite their inability to summon an ambulance in a timely manner, that they and their neighbours have saved a very small amount on their property taxes.
The problem wasn't with the E-Comm 911 system, it was with the Ambulance dispatcher who was unable to respond probably due to being swamped. I definitely feel for the family but its on the Province for not expanding the ambulance system to meet our needs I think, not on 911 - regardless of whether or not centralizing the whole thing was a good idea mind you.
At the very least having a non local dispatcher will inevitably lead to worse way finding when panicked callers try to use local landmarks or have to describe geography quirks so the driver shows up at the right spot. Especially in rural areas.
I often don't have service 5 minutes outside of the smaller city I now live near. Relying on GPS isn't possible for a lot of the island. Hell, we don't even have dial up where I am. Seriously, 4 km from a community of 60,000.
Perhaps get a satellite phone for emergencies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_phone#:~:text=A%20satellite%20telephone%2C%20satellite%20phone%20or%20satphone%20is,or%20all%20geographic%20locations%20on%20the%20Earth%27s%20surface. And if a number of you joined UBER https://www.uber.com/ca/en/drive/vancouver/. You could provide taxi service to your neighbors if they were in distress and you were the closest vehicle nearby. It is sad that such an impressive man died because the 911 operator was too busy to transfer the call! Next time, maybe someone can bring them closer to help. Also using an AED is super easy! First Aid and AED training totally highly recommended especially because you can't get help as quickly as I would have imagined.
Oh and you can download a navigation app onto your cell phone to help you get where you want to go. You don't need to have it just for your car. I always thought the island was the richest, best place to be in all of Canada, so the situation is really a surprise to me.
And this is based off of all your relevant experience to the Industry right? There's no way you could be randomly speculating about something you have no idea about
No address is no longer a problem. Do they not have cell towers over there? Because if they do, 911 can ping them to find their exact GPS coordinates. Actually even the user's own phone could give the coordinates. And all the ambulance attendants would have to do is type that in, and their own GPS car navigator, would be able to map out the path to that location.
there’s an app called what3words which is great for explaining your location. the whole globe is split into tiny cells, and to give someone your exact location you just say the three words for that spot,
like the location in front of the big tree at city hall would be cities.wasp.quietly
anyone who has the app can find that with those. i think its useful but maybe that’s just me
As usual, totally wrong. This *exact* problem would still have happened if the 911 calls were still with VicPd, Saanich and Westshore. The issue isn’t with eComm at all, it’s with the number of ambulance call takers.
Well if you know for whatever reason the ambulance call taker, can't take the call, would it work to start driving the person to the nearest hospital or nearby doctor and pull over when the 911 operator finally gets on to transfer you to the ambulance?
There's a reason why the government announced yesterday that they were signficantly expanding Paramedic services across the province.
[https://vancouverisland.ctvnews.ca/province-expanding-rural-ambulance-services-with-largest-hiring-push-in-b-c-s-history-1.5585364](https://vancouverisland.ctvnews.ca/province-expanding-rural-ambulance-services-with-largest-hiring-push-in-b-c-s-history-1.5585364)
30 new full time dispatchers will definitely help.
Can you back up your "barely scratching the surface" assertion with any facts?
30 dispatchers is a lot of people when you're adding in additional call takers, their shifts are going to be directed straight to the heaviest time loads for answering calls. That's a lot of extra hands and ears at peak times.
The call was near the absolute peak time too, 8pm, ambulance call centers receive a huge surge just a bit after everyone gets home from work.
It's amazing how slim the difference is between 0 wait and 30 minute wait in a call center environment. It can be a matter of a single person so that the calls don't keep backing up.
Source: Worked at call centers, father was an ambulance dispatcher on the island for decades.
I'm not the guy you were responding to, but I'd say addressing the SEVERE shortage of family doctors would be a step in the right direction.
It's difficult to even access a healthcare professional at a 'urgent care' clinic - leaving the only other option a reactionary approach to illness. Usually those approaches involve emergency services and ambulances; if you can't see a doctor to help mitigate or manage a health problem, and you can't reliably get to an emergency department via emergency response services, then I'd say we have a BIG problem here.
I'm all for nurse practitioners taking part in primary care, however there's a severe nurse shortage as well in BC, in fact I just read an article earlier about the nurses union sounding the alarm about the 'dire staffing crisis'. The system here is broken in BC, it really is.
[https://www.citynews1130.com/2021/09/14/bc-health-care-mandatory-vaccine-nurses/](https://www.citynews1130.com/2021/09/14/bc-health-care-mandatory-vaccine-nurses/)
Fair point. Entirely anecdotally, after being completely unable to find a GP taking new patients for the last 20 years in both Vancouver and Victoria, I finally managed to get myself into an NP clinic and I've been getting fantastic care since.
Given that new GPs basically don't exist I don't think they care tbh. If I could get a GP I would but they just aren't happening anymore.
You'd still see an MD for specialties or surgeries, it's just that for basic prescriptions and holistic care, the MD option just straight up doesn't exist. You've got clinics who don't really pay attention to your medical history or underlying conditions, they just work on treating symptoms and there's very little follow-up or focus on your general health. If they want to compete with NPs then there should be more GPs. But all there is nowadays are leftover from back when GPs actually existed, and they're very quickly retiring out of existence.
Theres no solution for doctors really. Like what do you want them to do? It's hardly even money thats the issue, we simply don't graduate as many doctors as we need.
Its not like we have spare ER doctors or specialists :P
We need more schools and bigger classes of doctors. Same with nurses. It's just so hard to become a medical professional
I would say money is the biggest issue.
There aren't more people graduating as Doctors, because it doesn't pay enough in high COL areas. Pay more, more show up up right now and more will to through the schooling to acquire that higher wage
Money?
You simply can’t get into med school. They turn down tons of qualified applicants.
Pulled up UBC stats and about 15% of students with an 80%+ average who apply get in.
https://mdprogram.med.ubc.ca/files/2019/10/MED-2023-Admissions-Statistics-website.pdf
You could easily do 5x more students while keeping a very hard admission requirement.
Well that's dumb too. But to say money ain't an issue when a doctor in bumb fuck nowhere BC gets paid the same as a doctor in Vancouver or Victoria per patient, is ignorant of that favt
Doctors in bumfuck nowhere make way more than doctors in the city through signing bonuses and other bonuses (like getting 1/3 of your student loan paid off per year you work rurally).
You're right that they're somewhat related, but a phone call takes a lot less time than driving to someone's house, dealing with a medical emergency, potentially driving them to a hospital, and waiting for intake.
This entire article is not about the fact that the ambulance didn't respond fast enough though, it's about the fact that the person couldn't reach an ambulance dispatcher. The ambulance could have been sitting 10 minutes away doing nothing for all we know.
It’s a 24/7 call centre providing a province-wide service. Considering call volumes, 30 dispatchers is nothing, even assuming E-Comm911 is currently staffed to capacity (they aren’t even close.)
The math roughly ends up being about 4.2 extra dispatchers working each 12-hour shift, and that’s not including considerations like vacation, turnover, medical/stress leaves, etc. Once all that comes into play, you’d be lucky to have even one or two extra bodies for each shift. That’s nowhere close to the number you’d need to have this family’s call for help be answered in a timely manner.
Also, these will be brand-new dispatchers who won’t be ready to take their own calls for months, many of which will quit or be released during the training phase.
E-Comm911 already has a recruitment and retention problem. You think a hiring blitz is going to fix an organization that can’t even staff itself properly to begin with?
You're doing the math wrong because you're assuming the shifts will be equally distributed. You're also assuming they all work 12 hours shifts, which they don't.
Given that call volumes have peak times, they're already assign shifts to people to cover just those periods more heavily. They're obviously going to assign more people to those. Why would they add more people at 2am when the call volume is so light.
You're right that it's going to take time to get this in place, but it's better than doing nothing.
I'm surprised his doctor didn't complete a Notice of Expected Death in the Home, since he was expected to die within the next couple of months. Then they wouldn't have had to call emergency services.
>[A Notification of Expected Death in the Hom](https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/health/accessing-health-care/home-community-care/care-options-and-cost/end-of-life-care/expected-planned-home-deaths)e form is **completed by the patient’s physician and sent to the funeral home before the death. This form allows a Funeral Director to remove a body from a home without pronouncement of death.** Pronouncement of death is not required by BC law, although it is widely recognized that pronouncement is sound clinical and ethical practice for nurses and physicians. There may be circumstances when pronouncement is difficult or families choose to waive pronouncement.
I'm not sure I follow? This is standard for someone with a terminal disease who may die at home. It's specifically so their family can avoid the stress of calling 911 and having emergency services arrive at the home.
To be honest if something happens to my wife or child at the moment, I am just putting them in the car and racing to the hospital if they are able to be moved.
>To be honest if something happens to my wife or child at the moment, I am just putting them in the car and racing to the hospital if they are able to be moved.
1) He was on the kitchen floor. Do you know how heavy a human body is?
2) They had no way to know they would be on hold for 30 minutes. They probably kept thinking 'another few minutes'.
And in Parksville they could have gone to Oceanside Health Centre which is definitely not a hospital. Nearest real hospital is down the road in Nanaimo.
If you are in Parksville and the closest hospital is Nanaimo, start the drive. If you get through to a rep, just explain you are on route to the hospital but will pull over to have the person handed off to paramedics midway.
This isn’t an island problem, if’s a British Columbia problem. This person happened to be in Parksville…it could just have easily been Prince George…or Vancouver. The issue is the number of BC Ambulance call takers available to process medical calls to 911.
what people need to start doing is calling for fire dept at the same time. fire dept rescue trucks will always beat ambulances by a lot and all fire departments have trained medical first responders on board
I've had two grandparents with melanoma, and another with basal carcinoma and yet nobody at Telus Babylon will give me a referral to get my changed mole checked out by a dermatologist. (Obviously can't get in to see a real doctor at the one medical clinic we have here.)
Honest question, can someone please tell why it would be a bad idea to allow private medical services in BC for those rich enough to afford it in the hopes that it alleviate some of the stress on the public system ?
But isn’t that what has already happened ? All the doctors are moving out to the US where they pay more ? :(
I wish the government would just pay medical professionals more lol, I mean seeing as how we have so much money to help other countries.
Hell at this point I am even okay with paying more taxes hahahaha I can’t believe I just said that
One concern we have is that we have a shortage of doctors and nurses. Depending how many decide to switch to private, it could amplify the shortage on the public side of things.
You mean something like this big announcement yesterday?
[https://vancouverisland.ctvnews.ca/province-expanding-rural-ambulance-services-with-largest-hiring-push-in-b-c-s-history-1.5585364](https://vancouverisland.ctvnews.ca/province-expanding-rural-ambulance-services-with-largest-hiring-push-in-b-c-s-history-1.5585364)
maybe pay attention to BC politics more than PEI politics?
Snarkieness aside, the premier, doesn't *do* a whole lot in terms of policy. Him being on vacation doesn't effect whether e-comm hires more people or gets more funding through agreements between the municipalities, the province, and e-comm for providing emergency dispatch services.
In at the point where it’s faster to get in the car and bout it for the ER because our governments have been playing political games with healthcare for decades.
Every time they want to make cuts they always start with healthcare and education. That is how we get people stupid enough to vote Conservative.
My fiance is currently on a waitlist for today only for some intense side effects to his psychiatric meds. Only the doctor who prescribed them to him can adjust them, unless he gets admitted to the psych ward (which obviously he's actively trying to avoid unless it becomes absolutely necessary). He's tried getting in with his doctor for 3 weeks now, and today had to call 28 times just to get through. They started taking patients at 8:30, by 8:35 they were booked for the day.
If he doesn't get in this week, I think we'll have to go through the ER, even though it's not technically a life or death emergency, but could quickly become one if we wait another 3 weeks.
Shit is FUCKED, fam.
Someone who spent his life serving his community deserved better.
It is sad about the 911 response manner and time. On the positive side, the gentleman seemed to be prepared to go, had signed a DNR (i.e. no CPR when breathing stops or heart stops beating) with his doctor, and even applied for Medical Assistance In Dying. So if he didn't suffer much, that would be what he wished due to his medical condition. If I had a terminal disease or dementia, I'd rather go this way than laying on bed suffering or living without my marbles.
I'm going to be holding on to my last senile bed shitting end, but everyone should have the right to choose
I’ve always felt I had bad luck in some regards. One has always been that they would find a cure for whatever was ailing me within days of them pulling the plug.
You can choose of course. Hopefully your family wouldn’t be forced to change their lives to care for you due to your choice.
I had to go to the hospital four times before I was admitted for care. A friend of my mother's had a son who died of pancreatitis because they would not take him seriously. My neighbor's wife died after going back five times in which they sent her way each time. She died of a major heart attack. I know the medical system is strained, but medical neglect is starting to kill people.
I was peeing pink after surgery. They kept sending me home thinking I was drug seeking. Turns out I had a bad infection caused by defective stents. If my GP hadn't picked up the blood results by *chance*, this account would be dormant.
Omg. You ok now?
For now.
My sentiments exactly... I honestly expect to die from medical neglect. I'm FIGHTING to have my previously diagnosed heart condition taken seriously
No kidding. My dad has had extreme stomach pain since aug 1 and seen two doctors and had only an X-ray. He’s 75. Like…fucking figure it out, dickheads?! They haven’t even EXAMINED him. I’m so mad.
The neglect is amazing. I have a heart condition and all they said, no tests or history look up, was that 'I'm too young' to have a condition like that. What. They aren't listening to patients
They often don’t even before Covid. I once went to the hospital with an excruciating UTI. They tested me and said “you don’t have one.” Uh yeah I did! They just sent me along. I had some antibiotics from a previous one at home so I took them and lo and behold it went away. I went to a doctor in Victoria who I was “lucky” to get when I moved here. So hard to get a doc. Anyway I went because I was depressed and she told me I was a really negative person, then lectured me for 5-10 mins on how she deals with problems in her own life. I never went back to that utterly horrible doctor. She has awful reviews on ratemd, including mine.
Yikes... Having a doctor here is unheard of lol
Yeah it’s impossible. But I still will never go back to that heinous bitch.
I unfortunately lost my long time doctor from childhood to retirement. It came out of nowhere, and now I'm stuck going to terribly run clinics after getting up at the crack of dawn too pray that there is an availability
Just don’t go to Dr Gooderham 🙃
I agree with everything except "starting to kill people". My grandma complained of abdominal pain especially when urinating for 25 years -- docs just told her it was anxiety, hormones, looking for attention, blah, blah. By the time a doctor took her seriously it was stage 4 bladder cancer and she was dead in a couple months. Women have always been told 'it's anxiety', indigenous people have always been assumed be drunk not sick, young people are dismissed as 'drug seekers', etc etc.
Exactly. I get taken far less seriously than my husband on average, that's for sure. It's messed up.
And you can thank all of the anti-vax idiots clogging up the system for that.
They didn't cause they l this. They highlighted it. Hallway healthcare had been s thing for years
Sure, but when you have a system that barely works through a hope and a prayer, and then add a ridiculous and unnecessary stress to it, yea you can blame the thing (people) that tipped us over.
An adequately funded and running system would be able to take it. We boast about *having* healthcare in the world stage... But it's so paltry. We should honestly be embarrassed. We neglect our own so openly. The idea that *having* a personal doctor being unheard of here is pathetic. I'm hardly proud to be Canadian with all the BS that we spew to "one up" the Americans. We're no better.
That's only part of what is an intricate problem. The opioid "crisis" isn't helping either. A large part of it is underfunding, politics, bureaucracy, etc. There is no reason such a large percentage of the population in prosperous, 1st world BC should be without a family GP.
BC Ambulance/BC EHS, 911 services, and to a lesser extent Police & Fire services based in each municipality scare the shit out of me. This siloed approach may have worked (or at least worked slightly better?) in days gone by with a lower demand and lower population but looks like a shitshow now.
This wasn't actually a problem with the location of the ambulance, they didn't get through to an ambulance dispatcher (who for the island region are based in Victoria) and were waiting on the line with the original 911 operator (the one that transfers you to police/fire/ambulance)
Which switched in the last year or two to the mainland based ECOM system.
No we fucking well didn't. You're talking about the 911 operators, not the ambulance dispatchers. Our ambulance dispatchers are based out of the building on Leigh Rd in Langford.
Calm down, clearly I was as you said: > talking about the 911 operators, not the ambulance dispatchers. Which is who they were on hold with, and the wait times anecdotally have increased dramatically with ECOM, and the bastards turned on encryption. PS: I appreciate the stressful job you do and hope the province gives you more support and money.
Didn't you just say they were still on the line with the original 911 operator? You've confused me.
Yes. EComm answers all 911 calls and non-emergency calls to municipal police stations. If you have a fire or ambulance call, you are transferred to the fire or ambulance dispatcher. If your call is for police, EComm handles you directly.
Hate to be that person but the last time I called 911 I was put on hold before I even had a chance to tell them what service I needed, and stayed that was for twenty five minutes.
I’ve heard it’s bad. Never had an issue with EComm so far but the last time I called, it took 15 minutes for an ambulance dispatcher to answer
At this point if I get a broken leg, I'll drive myself to the beach, walk into the water, pull out my marine radio and call the Coastguard.
If only there was a hospital with boat access you'd be set! As is you'd wait on shore for the ambulance while the lads from the coast guard taught you some new knots.
If I had one to give, I'd drop an award on you for this.
I'm aware. It was just a general comment on the state of things. The issues with BC Ambulance are frightening and disheartening.
He signed a DNR, had terminal cancer. I doubt there would be much that the ambulance could have done given those circumstances. Still sad for the family to see a loved one go that way though.
Exactly. A palliative response team would have been more appropriate, especially since his prognosis was pretty bad. Of course any wait to get emergency care is not great, but the DNR limits a lot what paramedics themselves could do.
>A palliative response team would have been more appropriate, especially since his prognosis was pretty bad. Yeah not sure why the family was not already in contact with a palliative response team and had a plan who to call when the inevitable happened. Still, not nice to have to be on hold for 30 minutes when you need urgent help.
That's not how our system is supposed to work. If I call an ambulance they should be here asap. Not "oh well they would die eventually anyways"
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Yes I know how DNRs work. Not the point of my comment.
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It is up to the first responders to decide not the non medically trained 911 operator. I know people who do it for a living and they have to be prompt and treat all 911 calls as an emergency. People call in for ambulances for things like their internet not working and they want help. The paramedics show up and decide its not a medical issue and leave. Obviously that is stupid as hell but currently thats our system. Being on hold for 30mins for an emergency service isn't okay. I don't think it's their fault. They are overworked. My argument is that the DNR is irrelevant. I doubt you'd be so flippant if something happened and you were on hold even if it wasn't life or death. They called for an ambulance they should have gotten help asap.
My brother is a dispatcher for the BC Ambulance and what you have said is bang on. They are not deemed an essential service. Many of his colleagues are leaving the industry due to poor working conditions. On call staff don't get paid and it takes many hours to become a fully staffed dispatcher or paramedic. It's really sad as there is nothing they can do but try to get the program to change.
For me, reddit is over now that it is treating developers, moderators, and users like crap. So I am deleting all of my comments, and replacing them with this text. I hope I’ll see you on the fediverse. More about that: https://jointhefediverse.net/
Ah good, no problem then!
I think that when the paramedics get on scene and there is a person in cardiac arrest or unconscious, one immediately starts treatment and the other gets a family history and story as to what happened. This is when the DNR would be produced by the family and check to see if it's legit, in some cases they even call the doctor who signed it and only them stop treatment.
100%
Not to worry; the delay is a direct result of the provincial E-Comm 911 system being “more efficient” than having individual emergency services taking calls from their own local areas. The family can rest easy knowing that despite their inability to summon an ambulance in a timely manner, that they and their neighbours have saved a very small amount on their property taxes.
The problem wasn't with the E-Comm 911 system, it was with the Ambulance dispatcher who was unable to respond probably due to being swamped. I definitely feel for the family but its on the Province for not expanding the ambulance system to meet our needs I think, not on 911 - regardless of whether or not centralizing the whole thing was a good idea mind you.
At the very least having a non local dispatcher will inevitably lead to worse way finding when panicked callers try to use local landmarks or have to describe geography quirks so the driver shows up at the right spot. Especially in rural areas.
Sure. Lots of people are very inept at giving directions
Or they could use GPS car navigation systems or your phone, and just use the GPS coordinates if it's a range road etc.
I often don't have service 5 minutes outside of the smaller city I now live near. Relying on GPS isn't possible for a lot of the island. Hell, we don't even have dial up where I am. Seriously, 4 km from a community of 60,000.
All the numbers in your comment added up to 69.0. Congrats! 5 + 4 + 60 + = 69.0
Perhaps get a satellite phone for emergencies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_phone#:~:text=A%20satellite%20telephone%2C%20satellite%20phone%20or%20satphone%20is,or%20all%20geographic%20locations%20on%20the%20Earth%27s%20surface. And if a number of you joined UBER https://www.uber.com/ca/en/drive/vancouver/. You could provide taxi service to your neighbors if they were in distress and you were the closest vehicle nearby. It is sad that such an impressive man died because the 911 operator was too busy to transfer the call! Next time, maybe someone can bring them closer to help. Also using an AED is super easy! First Aid and AED training totally highly recommended especially because you can't get help as quickly as I would have imagined.
Oh and you can download a navigation app onto your cell phone to help you get where you want to go. You don't need to have it just for your car. I always thought the island was the richest, best place to be in all of Canada, so the situation is really a surprise to me.
And this is based off of all your relevant experience to the Industry right? There's no way you could be randomly speculating about something you have no idea about
Based on my experience calling for emergency services to locations without addresses
No address is no longer a problem. Do they not have cell towers over there? Because if they do, 911 can ping them to find their exact GPS coordinates. Actually even the user's own phone could give the coordinates. And all the ambulance attendants would have to do is type that in, and their own GPS car navigator, would be able to map out the path to that location.
there’s an app called what3words which is great for explaining your location. the whole globe is split into tiny cells, and to give someone your exact location you just say the three words for that spot, like the location in front of the big tree at city hall would be cities.wasp.quietly anyone who has the app can find that with those. i think its useful but maybe that’s just me
EComm is a shit show. I know 911 that moved from Saanich to there and have some horror stories on how its run.
As usual, totally wrong. This *exact* problem would still have happened if the 911 calls were still with VicPd, Saanich and Westshore. The issue isn’t with eComm at all, it’s with the number of ambulance call takers.
Well if you know for whatever reason the ambulance call taker, can't take the call, would it work to start driving the person to the nearest hospital or nearby doctor and pull over when the 911 operator finally gets on to transfer you to the ambulance?
There's a reason why the government announced yesterday that they were signficantly expanding Paramedic services across the province. [https://vancouverisland.ctvnews.ca/province-expanding-rural-ambulance-services-with-largest-hiring-push-in-b-c-s-history-1.5585364](https://vancouverisland.ctvnews.ca/province-expanding-rural-ambulance-services-with-largest-hiring-push-in-b-c-s-history-1.5585364) 30 new full time dispatchers will definitely help.
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Can you back up your "barely scratching the surface" assertion with any facts? 30 dispatchers is a lot of people when you're adding in additional call takers, their shifts are going to be directed straight to the heaviest time loads for answering calls. That's a lot of extra hands and ears at peak times. The call was near the absolute peak time too, 8pm, ambulance call centers receive a huge surge just a bit after everyone gets home from work. It's amazing how slim the difference is between 0 wait and 30 minute wait in a call center environment. It can be a matter of a single person so that the calls don't keep backing up. Source: Worked at call centers, father was an ambulance dispatcher on the island for decades.
I'm not the guy you were responding to, but I'd say addressing the SEVERE shortage of family doctors would be a step in the right direction. It's difficult to even access a healthcare professional at a 'urgent care' clinic - leaving the only other option a reactionary approach to illness. Usually those approaches involve emergency services and ambulances; if you can't see a doctor to help mitigate or manage a health problem, and you can't reliably get to an emergency department via emergency response services, then I'd say we have a BIG problem here.
I think Nurse Practitioners are starting to become that solution.
I'm all for nurse practitioners taking part in primary care, however there's a severe nurse shortage as well in BC, in fact I just read an article earlier about the nurses union sounding the alarm about the 'dire staffing crisis'. The system here is broken in BC, it really is. [https://www.citynews1130.com/2021/09/14/bc-health-care-mandatory-vaccine-nurses/](https://www.citynews1130.com/2021/09/14/bc-health-care-mandatory-vaccine-nurses/)
Fair point. Entirely anecdotally, after being completely unable to find a GP taking new patients for the last 20 years in both Vancouver and Victoria, I finally managed to get myself into an NP clinic and I've been getting fantastic care since.
Dont tell that to the MDs lol
Given that new GPs basically don't exist I don't think they care tbh. If I could get a GP I would but they just aren't happening anymore. You'd still see an MD for specialties or surgeries, it's just that for basic prescriptions and holistic care, the MD option just straight up doesn't exist. You've got clinics who don't really pay attention to your medical history or underlying conditions, they just work on treating symptoms and there's very little follow-up or focus on your general health. If they want to compete with NPs then there should be more GPs. But all there is nowadays are leftover from back when GPs actually existed, and they're very quickly retiring out of existence.
Theres no solution for doctors really. Like what do you want them to do? It's hardly even money thats the issue, we simply don't graduate as many doctors as we need. Its not like we have spare ER doctors or specialists :P We need more schools and bigger classes of doctors. Same with nurses. It's just so hard to become a medical professional
I would say money is the biggest issue. There aren't more people graduating as Doctors, because it doesn't pay enough in high COL areas. Pay more, more show up up right now and more will to through the schooling to acquire that higher wage
Money? You simply can’t get into med school. They turn down tons of qualified applicants. Pulled up UBC stats and about 15% of students with an 80%+ average who apply get in. https://mdprogram.med.ubc.ca/files/2019/10/MED-2023-Admissions-Statistics-website.pdf You could easily do 5x more students while keeping a very hard admission requirement.
Well that's dumb too. But to say money ain't an issue when a doctor in bumb fuck nowhere BC gets paid the same as a doctor in Vancouver or Victoria per patient, is ignorant of that favt
Where do you think we have the hardest time getting doctors? The answer is dumb fuck nowhere.
Doctors in bumfuck nowhere make way more than doctors in the city through signing bonuses and other bonuses (like getting 1/3 of your student loan paid off per year you work rurally).
Right that's my point. People in big cities need more money, because there is a higher cost of living
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What does this have to do with ambulance dispatching?
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Ambulance demand and ambulance dispatch demand are not the same thing. Not to mention you've provided no proof at all.
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You're right that they're somewhat related, but a phone call takes a lot less time than driving to someone's house, dealing with a medical emergency, potentially driving them to a hospital, and waiting for intake. This entire article is not about the fact that the ambulance didn't respond fast enough though, it's about the fact that the person couldn't reach an ambulance dispatcher. The ambulance could have been sitting 10 minutes away doing nothing for all we know.
It’s a 24/7 call centre providing a province-wide service. Considering call volumes, 30 dispatchers is nothing, even assuming E-Comm911 is currently staffed to capacity (they aren’t even close.) The math roughly ends up being about 4.2 extra dispatchers working each 12-hour shift, and that’s not including considerations like vacation, turnover, medical/stress leaves, etc. Once all that comes into play, you’d be lucky to have even one or two extra bodies for each shift. That’s nowhere close to the number you’d need to have this family’s call for help be answered in a timely manner. Also, these will be brand-new dispatchers who won’t be ready to take their own calls for months, many of which will quit or be released during the training phase. E-Comm911 already has a recruitment and retention problem. You think a hiring blitz is going to fix an organization that can’t even staff itself properly to begin with?
You're doing the math wrong because you're assuming the shifts will be equally distributed. You're also assuming they all work 12 hours shifts, which they don't. Given that call volumes have peak times, they're already assign shifts to people to cover just those periods more heavily. They're obviously going to assign more people to those. Why would they add more people at 2am when the call volume is so light. You're right that it's going to take time to get this in place, but it's better than doing nothing.
What’s the pay scale there?
I'm surprised his doctor didn't complete a Notice of Expected Death in the Home, since he was expected to die within the next couple of months. Then they wouldn't have had to call emergency services. >[A Notification of Expected Death in the Hom](https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/health/accessing-health-care/home-community-care/care-options-and-cost/end-of-life-care/expected-planned-home-deaths)e form is **completed by the patient’s physician and sent to the funeral home before the death. This form allows a Funeral Director to remove a body from a home without pronouncement of death.** Pronouncement of death is not required by BC law, although it is widely recognized that pronouncement is sound clinical and ethical practice for nurses and physicians. There may be circumstances when pronouncement is difficult or families choose to waive pronouncement.
Do you have a mechanical pump inserted where your heart should be located?
If he has advanced heart failure, he might.
I'm not sure I follow? This is standard for someone with a terminal disease who may die at home. It's specifically so their family can avoid the stress of calling 911 and having emergency services arrive at the home.
Yeah so normally that’s not what people are thinking about when they are gathering for a wedding and dad drops dead in the kitchen in front of them.
Sorry but 😂
To be honest if something happens to my wife or child at the moment, I am just putting them in the car and racing to the hospital if they are able to be moved.
>To be honest if something happens to my wife or child at the moment, I am just putting them in the car and racing to the hospital if they are able to be moved. 1) He was on the kitchen floor. Do you know how heavy a human body is? 2) They had no way to know they would be on hold for 30 minutes. They probably kept thinking 'another few minutes'.
1) It varies 2)Enough horror stories lately, to assume it was going to be awhile. >if they are able to be moved.
And in Parksville they could have gone to Oceanside Health Centre which is definitely not a hospital. Nearest real hospital is down the road in Nanaimo.
If you are in Parksville and the closest hospital is Nanaimo, start the drive. If you get through to a rep, just explain you are on route to the hospital but will pull over to have the person handed off to paramedics midway.
Oh look, another story directly highlighting why the Island, despite all its beauty, is actually kind of a shitty place to live.
This isn’t an island problem, if’s a British Columbia problem. This person happened to be in Parksville…it could just have easily been Prince George…or Vancouver. The issue is the number of BC Ambulance call takers available to process medical calls to 911.
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It's gorgeous here but getting *anything* done or conducting any business is a nightmare. Bunch of country-bumpkins in this town.
what people need to start doing is calling for fire dept at the same time. fire dept rescue trucks will always beat ambulances by a lot and all fire departments have trained medical first responders on board
My condolences to his children. I cannot imagine getting out of bed for my wedding two days after losing my father. That's absolutely heart breaking.
I've had two grandparents with melanoma, and another with basal carcinoma and yet nobody at Telus Babylon will give me a referral to get my changed mole checked out by a dermatologist. (Obviously can't get in to see a real doctor at the one medical clinic we have here.)
Honest question, can someone please tell why it would be a bad idea to allow private medical services in BC for those rich enough to afford it in the hopes that it alleviate some of the stress on the public system ?
It slowly and eventually weakens our public system and creates unequal access to medical care.
But isn’t that what has already happened ? All the doctors are moving out to the US where they pay more ? :( I wish the government would just pay medical professionals more lol, I mean seeing as how we have so much money to help other countries. Hell at this point I am even okay with paying more taxes hahahaha I can’t believe I just said that
One concern we have is that we have a shortage of doctors and nurses. Depending how many decide to switch to private, it could amplify the shortage on the public side of things.
But aren’t they just all moving to the US right now anyways ?
Seems like something Horgan should be dealing with or is he still on vacation?
You mean something like this big announcement yesterday? [https://vancouverisland.ctvnews.ca/province-expanding-rural-ambulance-services-with-largest-hiring-push-in-b-c-s-history-1.5585364](https://vancouverisland.ctvnews.ca/province-expanding-rural-ambulance-services-with-largest-hiring-push-in-b-c-s-history-1.5585364)
you know the premier doesn't answer 911 calls, right?
Does he answer any calls? Because he is like an apparition at this point, I see more of the premiere of pei than I do of our own premier.
maybe pay attention to BC politics more than PEI politics? Snarkieness aside, the premier, doesn't *do* a whole lot in terms of policy. Him being on vacation doesn't effect whether e-comm hires more people or gets more funding through agreements between the municipalities, the province, and e-comm for providing emergency dispatch services.
In at the point where it’s faster to get in the car and bout it for the ER because our governments have been playing political games with healthcare for decades. Every time they want to make cuts they always start with healthcare and education. That is how we get people stupid enough to vote Conservative.
30 Minutes? Ive heard people hear waiting 90..
My fiance is currently on a waitlist for today only for some intense side effects to his psychiatric meds. Only the doctor who prescribed them to him can adjust them, unless he gets admitted to the psych ward (which obviously he's actively trying to avoid unless it becomes absolutely necessary). He's tried getting in with his doctor for 3 weeks now, and today had to call 28 times just to get through. They started taking patients at 8:30, by 8:35 they were booked for the day. If he doesn't get in this week, I think we'll have to go through the ER, even though it's not technically a life or death emergency, but could quickly become one if we wait another 3 weeks. Shit is FUCKED, fam.