Katikati resident upset with St John response time to medical alert

Katikati resident Ken Allen at his home. Photo / Shauni James

Katikati resident Ken Allen says it is "unacceptable" that it took two-and-a-half hours for an ambulance to get to his house after he activated his medical alarm.

St John has reviewed the handling of the call and says an assessment was made that Allen's condition was not life-threatening or time-critical and ambulances in the area were at the time attending to patients needing an immediate response.

Allen said on October 8, he was on the couch and was heavily perspiring. He felt dizzy when he tried to get up and was losing his balance.

He said he sat back down and about 10 minutes later got back up but was dizzy, perspiring, and his eyesight had faded so he could not clearly see what he was looking at.

He also started developing pains across the lower portions of his stomach, he said.

Allen said he was living by himself in the RSA and Homewood Trust Village and had to get himself to the bedroom.

To get there, he had to get up off the couch, use his hands to feel his way around furniture and get through to the bedroom where he pressed his medical alert.

He said he first activated his alarm at 5.45pm and reactivated it a second time at 6.30pm.

Within the two-and-a-half hours, he got two calls from St John, which included St John trying to do an assessment over the phone, but he was having trouble hearing and asking for them to get an ambulance, he said.

He said in those calls they said another urgent/emergency call was coming through and they had to take it, and one said if we don't get another emergency, we could possibly have an ambulance with you in 15 minutes.

"For me, this is absolutely unacceptable and I feel I've got to do something about it."

Allen said being a senior citizen, coming up to 87 years of age in January, he was of the understanding that a medical alert meant the person required medical attention promptly.

St John territory manager Ross Clarke said St John took patient safety very seriously and had been in contact with the patient.

"When St John receives a medical alarm activation, the monitoring team calls the patient back to determine what help is required.

"If an ambulance is required, the patient is transferred to an emergency call handler who asks a series of clinical questions and a priority is assigned to the call."

St John has now reviewed the handling of the call.

"In this case, the incident was correctly triaged as not being immediately life-threatening or time-critical. Ambulances in the area were attending patients requiring an immediate response."

Ross said when all ambulances were committed to urgent incidents, there would likely be a delay in responding to a non-life threatening incident.

"St John emergency vehicles operate as a network, and the closest ambulance may not be the local station ambulance.

"The Katikati ambulance may respond to incidents in other areas, and an ambulance from another area, such as Tauranga, may be sent to Katikati to cover, should there be an incident requiring an immediate, emergency response."