FLORENCE – Local emergency services are facing a rising number of non-urgent calls, draining resources and demoralizing staff.
Experts say the problem is part of a nationwide issue, with doctors reporting a higher number of calls that may not require emergency care and encouraging patients to consider their options before calling 911.
“We didn’t educate (patients) about what we were there for and what we weren’t there for and when to call,” said Barrott Dowdy, director of emergency services in Florence County.
Sometimes the calls are in a medical gray area. Other times, the calls are decidedly not appropriate for emergency services, Dowdy said. It’s common for parents trying to convince their child to go to school to call an ambulance in Florence County, he said.
Dowdy stressed that Florence County EMS remains capable of responding to emergencies and will do everything possible to help patients. By law, EMS must respond and transport patients upon request.
But the large number of calls – some of which could be handled in other ways – costs time and money, contributes to staff turnover and unnecessarily ties up resources, Dowdy said.
In July, Florence County EMS responded to 2,501 calls, of which 122 patients were classified by the dispatcher as “emergency,” meaning it was a life-threatening emergency, Dowdy said.
Nearly 1,600 of the calls were classified as low-level emergencies and sent to the emergency room. Many of those calls were justified, Dowdy said. Others were not.
Nearly 800 of the calls did not result in transport, and staff were unable to locate a patient in 84 calls, Dowdy said.
These classifications are imprecise. What is an emergency for one person may not be an emergency for another. Dowdy estimated that, in general, more than half of Florence County EMS calls are at the lowest emergency level.
