• Font Size    

Most Popular Videos Featured On KDKA.com

Mayor Luke Ravenstahl, Wife Split
E-mail

Close Window E-mail This Page

Non-Emergency Calls Clog Pittsburgh EMS System

Required fields are marked with an asterisk(*)

The information you provide will be used only to send the requested e-mail and will not be used to send any other e-mail communications. Read more in our Privacy Policy

Send E-mail

   Print     Share +   
Nov 3, 2008 4:50 pm US/Eastern

Non-Emergency Calls Clog Pittsburgh EMS System

Reporting
Andy Sheehan
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) ― It's called an emergency medical service, but every day Pittsburgh EMS is clogged with non-emergencies.

People with toothaches, headaches -- even hang nails, and it's costing you -- the taxpayers -- millions every year. It may even be placing you in danger.

These non-emergency are expensive and making it harder for paramedics to get to real emergencies. So, KDKA Investigator Andy Sheehan rode along to see it all first hand.

And and no sooner do we hit the road with District Chief Scott Everitt than we get one of those questionable calls.

"There's a call right there. Guy fell Saturday and now his neck and back hurt."

Five days have passed since the fall -- and chance that something is broken is very slim.

"It's a catch 22. Do we really need to take this guy to the hospital?  Well maybe. Maybe not."

But paramedics do take the man to West Penn Hospital -- where they wheel him into the ER, joined there by another ambulance who have transported a man with a wrenched shoulder -- another non-emergency case.

Paramedics respond to all sort of non-emergencies.

"Hang nails," says one. "People call because their remote falls."

"We've had people call us because they need their water bottle filled," says another.

"People with toothaches," says a third.

Many have no health insurance or primary care doctors.

"Some of them believe that the service is free," says one paramedic.

It isn't.

"There's a cost and it's a cost that's born by the taxpayers of the city of Pittsburgh," says Pittsburgh Controller Michael Lamb.

It costs about $300 for each hospital run. The city's tries to get reimbursed by insurance companies or medicaid, but according to Lamb's audit of EMS, taxpayers pay the difference -- about $2.5 million this year.

And those calls have another impact -- increasing response times to real emergencies.

While we were out -- all but three of one of the city's ambulances were tied up on calls on mostly non-emergencies. The national standard for responding to emergency calls is 9 minutes but Lamb's audit found that Pittsburgh EMS exceeded that in 60 percent of the transports.

"If they're responding to those calls and there's a real emergency, obviously the reponse time's going to go up.  It's a real problem."

But EMS Chief Bob McCaughan is reluctant to turn down callers because some injuries may be even more serious than the caller knows and the city would be held liable.  EMS, he says, is the last recourse for the uninsured.

"We along with many other EMS systems across the country have become the safety net for the health care system at large."

(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)

Featured Slideshows On KDKA.com

You need the latest Flash player to view video content.
Click here to download.

Click here to bypass this detection if you already have the latest Flash Player.

Local News

Top News Stories

© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.