The incident occurred at the end of the year in Milików. We described the case in the article: Milików: “There are no available ambulances.” The man could not be saved.

Firefighters from OSP Nowogrodziec reported at the time:

The injured person’s family informed us that they had received a reply from the emergency number 112: “There are no available ambulances.” After these words, one of our firefighters was called, and he remotely activated the emergency siren, calling other firefighters to help and notifying the State Fire Service that our intervention was necessary. A police patrol arrived at the scene. Ultimately, the emergency medical team did not arrive at the scene.

After the information was published, one of the paramedics from Bolesławiec called us and said that the situation had not looked that way at all, and that the emergency service had refused to come and provide assistance. We asked the deceased man’s family and the Emergency Service in Legnica, which manages ambulances in our region, for explanations.

The family promised to explain the details of the incident to us, but did not do so.

We did, however, receive extensive information from the Emergency Service in Legnica. It turned out that it had already been known when the first report was made that the man was dead. Therefore, no ambulance was sent, and the death was to be certified by a family doctor. The emergency service responded correctly. Later, when the firefighters took action, an automated system notified the emergency service of a new incident, and the dispatcher had to send an ambulance. The paramedics set out. In the meantime, however, the dispatcher established by telephone that it was the same incident, and the ambulance was recalled.

We present the detailed explanations below:

Legnica, 20 January 2021

In connection with the letter received concerning the incident in Milików on 28 December 2020, an explanatory investigation was conducted.

The medical documentation was reviewed, and the conversations recorded at the medical dispatch center were listened to.

It was established that:

  1. The first report from Milików was received at 9:24 a.m. Based on the medical interview conducted with the reporting person, the medical dispatcher established that the 80-year-old man showed signs of death. In such situations, the medical dispatcher directs the reporting person to a family doctor or a doctor providing overnight, weekend and holiday healthcare, who is obliged to certify the death and complete the formalities, because emergency medical teams, in accordance with the applicable provisions of the State Emergency Medical Services Act, cannot be dispatched to certify a death. The medical dispatcher provided this information to the reporting person. The call was considered completed.
  2. At 9:43 a.m., another report was received by the medical dispatch center via a telecommunications connection from the State Fire Service—an unvoiced report. The reason for the report was: “the patient is not breathing and is cyanotic.” In the case of a so-called “unvoiced” report—a report entered into the State Emergency Medical Services system without a medical interview—the medical dispatcher is obliged to immediately dispatch an emergency medical team to the scene, which is what he did. During the following minutes, because the report had been received without a voice message, the medical dispatcher attempted to obtain more detailed information by telephone about the incident itself and the patient’s condition. After speaking with a woman who had witnessed the incident and with a volunteer firefighter from the Volunteer Fire Service who was at the scene, the medical dispatcher established that the man to whom the emergency medical team had been dispatched had already been dead for a considerable time. The detailed description provided by the firefighter of the condition in which the man’s body was found indicated that death had occurred much earlier, before the emergency services arrived. In view of the above, the emergency medical team could no longer help in any way, so the medical dispatcher concluded handling the report and recalled the emergency medical team before it reached Milików.

In view of the above facts, I state that

  • the medical dispatcher did not refuse to send an emergency medical team to the patient;
  • the person for whom emergency services were called did not die while being assisted by OSP firefighters; rather, death occurred considerably earlier, before the emergency services arrived.

Yours faithfully,
Acting Deputy Director for Medical Affairs
Marek Gorczyński