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Dispatch Priority Levels

A Systematic Review of the Relationship Between Ambulant Status and the Need for a Lights-and-Siren Ambulance Response to Crashes

Ellen Ceklic, GCHumanFact BSc (Hons), Hideo Tohira, PhD, MD, MEng, MPH, FJAAM, Stephen Ball, PhD, GradDip (GIS), BSc, Judith Finn, PhD, MEdSt, GradDipPH, BSc, DipAppSc, RN, RM, ICCert, FACN, FAHA

Mar 04, 2020|AEDR 2019 Vol. 7 Issue 3|Original Research

Motor vehicle crashes (MVCs) can result in life-threatening injuries, and ambulances are therefore often dispatched at the highest priority response of lights­ and-siren (L&S). However, assigning L&S ambulance response based on type of incident alone may result in over-triage, meaning that the patient's condition did not warrant L&S ambulance response. Potentially, the ambulatory status of the MVC patient at the scene (i.e., whether they can walk) could help inform the ambulance dispatch priority, given that ambulation reflects...

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The Distribution of a Fire Priority Dispatch System's™ Call Incident Types and Priority Levels in Selected U.S. Fire Agencies

Jay Dornseif, Brett Johnson, Angela VanDyke, Donald Robinson, Tami Wiggins, Lori Daubert, Mark Hutchison, Sharon Crook, Kevin Sipple, Lisa Kalmbach, Greg Scott, MBA, EMD-QI, Isabel Gardett, PhD, Jeff J. Clawson, MD, Christopher Olola, PhD

Aug 12, 2014|AEDR 2014 Vol. 2 Issue 2|Original Research

The extent of fire emergencies in our communities is of great concern, not only to the public, but to the nation's fire departments, whose role is not only to respond to them, but to mitigate and, even earlier, to prevent them. The variety of types of fire-related emergencies reported to 911 is of significant interest to this ongoing mandate. The aim of this study was to characterize the distribution of calls handled using a Fire Priority Dispatch System (FPDS™) in the studied agencies. This was a retrospective and non-controlled descriptive study...

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Characterization of Call Prioritization Time in a Police Priority Dispatch System™

David Warner, Shawn Messinger, Chris Knight, Greg Scott, MBA, EMD-QI, Jeff J. Clawson, MD, Isabel Gardett, PhD, Tracey Barron, BS, Mark Rector, Brett Patterson, Lazaro Guerra, Angela VanDyke, Christopher Olola, PhD

Aug 10, 2014|AEDR 2014 Vol. 2 Issue 2|Original Research

Time-to-dispatch in a 911 center continues to be a topic of much discussion in public safety. This study represents a first attempt to classify a subset of time-todispatch, call prioritization time, the time required to gather critical information prior to dispatching the call. The study characterizes call prioritization time in two Police dispatching agencies by determining overall median call prioritization time for all Chief Complaints (CCs) in the agencies studied, then by determining specific call prioritization times for the top five most commonly-used CCs...

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The Distribution Of Emergency Police Dispatch Call Incident Types and Priority Levels Within the Police Priority Dispatch System

Shawn Messinger, David Warner, Chris Knight, Greg Scott, MBA, EMD-QI, Mark Rector, Tracey Barron, BS, Angela VanDyke, Lazaro Guerra, Isabel Gardett, PhD, Brett Patterson, Jeff J. Clawson, MD, Christopher Olola, PhD

Aug 03, 2013|AEDR 2013 Vol. 1 Issue 2|Original Research

911 centers receive a wide variety of calls for police-related incidents. Using the Police Priority Dispatch System (PPDS®), a 911 Emergency Police Dispatcher (EPD) categorizes each incident with a specific Chief Complaint (CC) and prioritizes the case using a systematic alpha-numeric coding matrix. The wide variation in CC types and specific codes assigned can profoundly affect staffing and resource deployment decisions made by law enforcement agencies. However, the frequency of specific call types and priority levels in the PPDS has not been studied formally to date. The objective of...

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