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ADVOCATE END UP IN STATE HOSPITAL BUT HAVE A MEDICAL AID - HE DIED BECAUSE OF A LACK OF MEDICAL AID INFORMATION
The PRETORIA NEWS of 17 August 2005, reports under the heading ‘My son’s death could have been prevented’ the true but sad story of Advocate Willem Peters who died after he was seriously injured in an accident on the N12 near Witbank. “Willem lay in a State hospital with severe brain damage as an unidentified person for 16 hours before his family found him.” The report starts with the following: “A young advocate’ life might have been saved if he had been identified sooner and received maximum treatment in the essential golden hour after the accident.”
Peter’s wife and his father became worried when they did not hear from him. They phoned every hospital and police station in the area. That night they activated Peter’s tracking system. His car was tracked to a panel beater. Only then did the family heard about the accident that happened early that morning.
A relative found him in a coma in the Witbank General Hospital. Time was against him.
MULTIPLE PATIENTS IS CHAOS
The PRETORIA NEWS of 30 January 2007 reported about a swarm of bees that attacked children at a crèche in Pretoria. 57 Children were transported to various hospitals. “Kruger said that she frantically searched for her son, but could not find him. She said a paramedic suggested she check with the five hospitals the children were admitted to.”
The PRETORIA NEWS of 5 March 2008, reports under the heading ‘Nightmare: 3 pupils die’ that “police officers had their hands full restraining anxious parents, neighbours and school principals trying to get to the scene to determine who the pupils were.” “We treated about 54 patients on the scene – one person was in a critical condition and two others serious. It was a nightmare to establish who the patients were and if they have a medical aid.”
WHAT DO PARAMEDICS AND THE POLICE HAVE TO SAY?
During the CARTE Blanche (Your card or your life program of 9 November 2003) paramedics with 24 years collective experience reported: “From experience we got to know that you have to ask for medical aid. If you get to a private facility and the patient doesn’t have medical aid, they are not going to treat the patient. They are not even going to look at it. They are going to say, “Don’t even unload it. If the patient doesn’t have medical aid proof, take them straight to a provincial facility, which is not always very close”.
Hugo Minnaar, Critical Care Technologist and Paramedic of LifeMed Ambulance Service (0861 086 911.) said the following: “I write this letter as motivation to anyone that thinks that they do not need an identification system. On many accident scenes information is the big question. Who are these people? How will we notify their family? To which hospital do we take them – state or private hospital? Every day we ask these questions and take decisions accordingly.
These questions can be answered within seconds by a good identification system like the one from CrisisOnCall, which is known to Paramedics. If no proof of medical aid is available, the patient is taken to the nearest state hospital. Other information that is important to us includes allergies, current medication, etc. All these questions can be answered by the CrisisOnCall system.”
Willie Lightfoot, paramedic since 1993, said that every time paramedics are dispatched to a medical incident or accident they go to a total stranger. Their patients are unknown to them and they have to learn information related from the patient. This is not always possible due to various circumstances. The CrisisOnCall identification system with the backup of the call centre is very helpful and support paramedics in lifesaving situations. No person can be without CrisisOnCall.
THE INEFFECTIVENESS OF STICKERS ON VEHICLES
Many medical aid funds provide stickers with the funds’ name and an emergency number – without a membership number, or any identification of who the member is! The sticker does not apply to any specific occupant of the vehicle either.
To compound the problem of car stickers being an ineffective means of identification, vehicles are regularly sold with the stickers left attached to the window. The new owner might in fact also add another sticker to the window. In severe accidents windows are broken and the sticker on the window will also be in pieces.
A vehicle sticker is therefore unreliable unnecessary and ineffective. In fact, most paramedics ignore the vehicle stickers.
PATIENTS BEING ROBBED AND LEFT WITH NO LIFE SAVING INFORMATION
PRETORIA NEWS (19 September 2009) “Motorbike rider killed in accident – and gets robbed.
“WHILE a Pretoria motorcyclist lay unconscious in his own blood after being flung off a 10m-high bridge, a number of homeless people squatting nearby make use of the man’s misfortune to steal his belongings.” He later died in a state hospital. Tshwane Metro Police spokesperson, Senior Superintendent Alta Fourie said in this article that "theft of accident victims’ personal belongings is an unfortunate reality."
The situation regarding medical emergencies and information are also dealt with by Arrive Alive on their website: “In the event of an accident or a medical emergency it is often a stranger who comes to your rescue. A major concern for many people is personal identification and the notification of family members of such an event.
These strangers who come into our lives are everyday heroes and real life detectives. First and foremost their job is to save a life but once the patient is stabilised they have to identify the patient, enquire about medical aid and often contact family members.
The most obvious is to locate a wallet with medical aid card, driver’s license or other form of identification. If the emergency personnel were not first on scene this may have been stolen by bystanders.
Arrive Alive
THE SOUTH AFRICAN POLICE SERVICE ASK YOU TO "WEAR YOUR WRIST BAND”
Inspector Marias Ferreira of SAPS Pretoria’s Collision Unit, in his line of work, is frequently present at the site of serious collision scenes. Marias feels that he can no longer remain silent. What CrisisOnCall has been saying, is a reality. Day after day he sees how paramedics struggle to obtain life saving information.
At the same time he notes how efficiently the CrisisOnCall’s identification system works. Whenever a CrisisOnCall arm band is present, information is immediately provided by the CrisisOnCall’s control centre, and the patient can be attended to, and transported to the correct hospital.
He also adds the following about impact collisions: “To obtain information during a collision scenario is an impossible task. As a result of the impact, loose articles such as handbags, wallets, cell phones etc. become projectiles. Cell phones can disintegrate completely and are sometimes picked up 80m from the scene. Handbags with important documentation such as medical aid cards are thrown far from the immediate area of the collision. Role players seldom have the time to go searching for this important information during the situation.”
Collisions are unplanned, but membership of CrisisOnCall can be. Marias is calling on everyone who is a member of CrisisOnCall to be prepared for the unexpected by wearing their arm band. Tell your family and friends about CrisisOnCall too. It might, for all you know, save their lives one day. Marias and his family also wear their arm bands permanently.
THE STAR AND PRETORIA NEWS NEWSPAPERS COVERED THIS STOREY UNDER 'Medics quibble about shot boy' on 25 June 2010
An eight-year-old boy, who was shot by his father on Wednesday night, died while paramedics questioned the status of his medical aid.
Now, witnesses to the grisly scene are asking if the boy might have survived if paramedics had acted sooner. Around 6.15pm on Wednesday, a 36-year-old Naturena, Joburg, man shot his son and three-year-old daughter before turning the gun on himself. Justice Moloi was first on the scene of the killings and alleged the little boy was still breathing when he found him. "He wasn't conscious, but he was gasping," confirmed Faith Motaung, a nurse living in the complex and who phoned for an ambulance at 6.40pm. Residents said the boy was moved into an ambulance when the paramedics arrived at about 7.10pm - but he never made it to a hospital.
"They (the paramedics) started arguing and said they couldn't take him to hospital without medical aid," said Moloi. Motaung confirmed that she had seen paramedics asking the mother if her son was on medical aid because it would determine which hospital he was taken to. "She said he was on his father's, but she didn't have a copy with her," said Motaung.
The boy died before a decision was made.
(This is a true but sad storey about a child who lost his life because information regarding his medical aid was not timely available. If he had a CrisisOnCall identification arm band on his wrist the problem would have been solved in seconds. This is why we at CrisisOnCall urge families to become part of CrisisOnCall to assure when something like this do happen information will flow in time to save a life.)
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