Working with MAS (Metropolitan Ambulance Service) was rarely dull. I learnt not to anticipate to simply to take each call as it came in, but for every call there was a recording. One minute it was cruising along and quiet, the next a light plane had crashed and we were helping with the search for survivors, or fielding multiple calls from a local mall reporting an active shooter and an unknown number of injured.
It was Tough Work
It was a busy night, call after call, it was exhausting. We answered calls as well as radio controlled the ambulances after a certain time on sixteen hour night shifts. Four of us plus a supervisor looking after all of Melbourne with 72 ambulances. It was challenging.
All of our calls were recorded. This was a protection not just for us but for callers, and this time I was so grateful that we had those tapes because they saved me from a potentially life changing situation, if there accusations had been proved true, I could have been charged.
It Was an Incoherent Call
It was one of the busy nights and I answered the call to a frantic person on the other end of the phone. There were three people present at the scene, I don’t remember their genders but two were verbally panicking, while a third was unconscious on the floor lets call them S.
The first thing I did was confirm their location and send a unit lights and sirens, a person unconscious was a high emergency and we would get there as fast as we could.
More Information Was Needed
The patient S was on the floor and breathing, and their friends told me they thought that it was a diabetic coma. They asked if they should give S sugar and I said no, it wouldn’t help and would be a danger to them while they were unconscious.
They were panicking, and that is often dangerous, people do things that don’t make sense when they are super stressed and this night it sounded like they were under the influence of some substance. I asked them to keep an eye on S, and to monitor their breathing, we would be there soon to assist.
I encouraged them to turn S onto their side and to make sure their airway wasn’t blocked and to call us back if there was any change in their condition. I was confident that they were looking out for their friend and ended the call which was procedure. Our unit was only a couple of minutes away and I needed to answer other calls, we were swamped. I had no reason to be concerned.
The Next Day The Recording Came into Play
The next day I was approached and taken aside by my supervisor and boss. Sitting in the office, they told me that the patient S from the night before had died. Their friends had poured sugar down their throat after they had hung up the call and by the time our unit had arrived they were choking and they couldn’t be saved.
The friends told our officers that I had told them to pour the sugar and I was responsible for the death of their friend. There was an official report made and that’s why we were sitting in the office.
It was my turn to panic. I told them that I had actually told them not to pour sugar, but in my mind I was going over the conversation terrified that I had been responsible, maybe I had made a mistake.
That Recording Saved Me
My boss reassured me, they had gone through the recording and knew exactly what had happened. They even had the recording there and played the call back for me. I was so relieved, then furious that these people would have ruined my life to protect their own shitty behaviour.
That was the end of this situation, I was absolved, and we had proof. It was escalated to lawyers to deal with and I went back to work a little bit wiser about the ways of the shitty people and the lengths people will go to protect themselves without regard for who they hurt.
Peace OUT