Philadelphia Medic Reports

[bigboy00091]

I recently began scanning in Philadelphia and seem to be having trouble picking up the Ambulance-Hospital reports. My scanner (WS1065) is receiving signal from the city trunked system as I am picking up police/fire dispatch fine, but for ambulance reports, there is essentially nothing coming through. Given the amount of time the scanner has been on, a lack of activity is very unlikely to be the explanation. I double-checked the frequencies and talk groups and they are correct based on the RR database. The database also indicates that these talk groups are not encrypted. Do I need to include any frequencies besides the control frequencies? Any suggestions would be appreciated!

 

[trap5858]

Philly fire medics do not always issue a patient report. There is a specific list of hospitals that the dispatcher can contact over the radio and give a synopsis of what the squad is bringing in along with an ETA. In all of the years I have monitored Philly I have never heard the hospital acknowledge the transmission. Not a lot of information is passed along.

 

[hvytrucker]

Being that Philadelphia is a decent size city and there are 21 hospitals that are setup with thier own talkgroup you would think there would be lots of transmissions but like trap5858 said I too have hardly ever heard any traffic on those talkgroups.

 

[radio3353]

I don't listen to Philly much anymore. Do the radio room dispatchers still do hospital notifications (where they would tell all units to standby while they do a hospital notification?) Maybe that was only for trauma cases

 

[Steve162]

I worked in an Emergency Department in Philadelphia up until last year. The talk groups listed above are for the dispatcher to notify an ED of an incoming patient. At my ED that audio was connected to a PA system so everyone in the ED could hear it.

Prior to this they used a low-band system called HASTE- Hospital Alerting System Tone Encoded, which indeed it was.

As far as I know there are no medic-physician communications on this system. Most of the time the medics use a state protocol. If they need the doc they call a medical control ED via cellphone.

 

[Steve162]

I don't listen to Philly much anymore. Do the radio room dispatchers still do hospital notifications (where they would tell all units to standby while they do a hospital notification?) Maybe that was only for trauma cases

It's for any critical patient where they need a bed upon arrival and possibly specialty services such as Respiratory Therapy. That includes trauma but they're usually less specific since a trauma alert mobilizes the trauma surgeons, PAs, RTs, etc.

 

[trap5858]

The medics will contact Medical Command for refusal cases and anything that is beyond standard protocols. In the case of a refusal of service once medical command has discussed the case with the medic and is satisfied with situation the medics go available and announce that is a refusal per X hospital medical command.

 

[wa3ysu]

Just to clarify, the old HASTE system that was used to provide notification of an incoming medic unit to a hospital, was a one-way voice message from the dispatcher (as Steve162 pointed out above), and not the medic unit. The same is true of these hospital-specific talk-groups. It is not the medic unit that is providing the notifications, it is the dispatcher providing the message as an voice announcement (no acknowledgement by, or discussion with, the hospital on these talk-groups).

The medic unit provides the details of the critical nature of their patient to the dispatcher on the medic unit's operations talk-group (north or south medic 'band') and the dispatcher then repeats that same information on the hospital-specific talk-group. I have never heard these used for anyone other than a very critical patient.

These hospital notification talk-groups are definitely in use. On a typical Friday or Saturday night you will hear multiple notifications of critical patients going to Temple Trauma, Einstein Trauma, and Presbyterian Trauma as a result of street crime involving gunshots. In addition, it appears that they are periodically tested during the week. I frequently hear dispatch announce the name of the hospital and then provide a phone number for them to call dispatch to confirm receipt of the test (this is how I recently was able to submit entries for a few hospitals that were missing from the list). These seem to happen most frequency in the 8>10 am timeframe on weekdays.

 

[wa3ysu]

I forgot to add that I have not captured any traffic on talkgroups 193 and 197. As you can see from the list, the talkgroups proceed alphabetically through the hospital names. Using that logic, you could assume that talkgroup 197 was for Hahnemann Trauma, which closed in June of 2019.

I am baffled though about talkgroup 193, which seems to need to have an "E" name between Einstein and Episcopal.....

 

[captaincab]

Since the change I have heard very little on the trauma alert groups it’s possible it’s encrypted? But even when the haste system was used you didn’t hear much just trauma class 1-5 level of consciousness if security respiatory or pediatric services were needed on arrival and appx eta

 

[philacop]

I forgot to add that I have not captured any traffic on talkgroups 193 and 197. As you can see from the list, the talkgroups proceed alphabetically through the hospital names. Using that logic, you could assume that talkgroup 197 was for Hahnemann Trauma, which closed in June of 2019.

I am baffled though about talkgroup 193, which seems to need to have an "E" name between Einstein and Episcopal.....

That would be Einstein Elkins Park!!

 

[phillydjdan]

They are not encrypted, Captain. Very much in the clear and being used. Just aren't used nearly as much as the North and South Medic bands