Sheerin said:
Go figure that their response times aren't as rosy as they'd like us to believe.
Response Time must be recorded from the time a 9-1-1 line starts ringing at 4330 Dufferin, to when the patient receives the shock delivered by the difibrillator.
Even if Paramedics have to get to the 20th floor of a highrise, the clock does not stop recording.
That is how T-EMS measures Response Time.
I never really enjoyed being parked at Spadina and Bloor, Union Station etc at 0400. We seldom saw a station, except to book-on/off. They issued us coolers for mobile lunches. Forget about beds.
That is not meant as a complaint. I knew that when I hired on.
We understood why it had to be done. Operational neccessity. Same way as the police. Call comes over the radio, toss your cigarette out the window, throw the stick into Drive, turn on the lights ( we tried to keep the siren to a minimum ), and hit the gas/diesel pedal. ( That could be funny if you, or the guy you were with, was half-asleep behind the wheel.
)
It was the only way to keep Response Time respectable. Ambulances were always staffed to an absolute minimum. Car counts were dynamic and determined by the hour. ie: after 2300 Hrs, they dropped considerably. ( Fewer calls. Less traffic. = less Paramedics ) At 0200, the count took another big drop.
We also understood that slowly driving around our standby area, and keeping an eye on the streets at night between calls gave the public some degree of confidence. To be able to walk their streets safely at night. They could see we were out there to help them, and radio the police, if necessary. This was especially important before 9-1-1 and cell phones came along.
I have followed the TFS website on "Active Incidents" for a long time. It is updated every five minutes. Never, ever been shut down. Last time I checked was during the recent earthquake. Obviously, it triggered a lot of automatic alarms.
Today - for the first tiime ever - it gives this message:
"Active Incidents:
The following active incidents are dispatched from Toronto Fire Services Communication Centre. The contents are updated at five minute intervals from the CAD (Computer Aided Dispatch) system.
Sorry! The active incidents list is not available right now. Please try again later."
http://www.toronto.ca/fire/cadinfo/livecad.htm
"Fire services report still a mystery to councillors. Why the slow response times? Politicians want to know what a consultant learned: City councillors say it’s time they saw a $150,000 report that found the Toronto fire service is behind the times technologically and responds too slowly to emergency calls.":
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/830695--fire-services-report-still-a-mystery-to-councillors