Detroit paramedics fear they're losing the battle to save lives - video

[Bozita]

Last Updated: September 16. 2010 7:22AM
Charlie LeDuff
Detroit paramedics fear they're losing the battle to save lives
Charlie LeDuff / The Detroit News

Detroit
Nobody knows how deathly slow the Detroit ambulance system is better than the paramedics themselves.

Take the case of Detroit Fire Department paramedic Dave Smith, who late last month, was dispatched on a heart attack call to a dialysis center on the city's east side. When he and his partner arrived, the attendants were standing at the threshold, upset.

"We called you over a half-hour ago," they shouted.

Smith made his way to a man slumped in a chair in the back of the center. After a few furious moments trying to resuscitate him, Smith's eyes wandered up and settled on the victim's face.

"Uncle Alvin?" he croaked.

"I was lost and bewildered," Smith recalled. "It's bad out here. Real bad."

Smith attended his uncle's funeral the following Thursday. He called in to work sick to his stomach.

It happens all too often in this city. You call 911. Granny fell, you tell the operator. Or a woman's been shot. Or a man has gone into cardiac arrest. Then you wait for an ambulance. And you wait some more.

No one really knows what the ambulance response time is in Detroit, but for people who work in the ambulances for a living, they say it is unacceptable.


From The Detroit News: http://www.detnews.com/article/20100916/METRO08/9160409/Detroit-paramedics-fear-they-re-losing-the-battle-to-save-lives#ixzz0zistoroo