Paramedic on way to suicidal woman stopped ambulance to go to the shops
A PARAMEDIC delayed attending an urgent call to help a depressed and suicidal woman in order to pick up equipment for her home computer, a misconduct hearing was told yesterday.
Victoria Arnott, 38, admitted stopping on the way to the woman’s home to do personal shopping while on duty.
The former Scottish Ambulance Service (SAS) worker agreed she had visited a store without seeking authorisation from the control centre but denied misusing an ambulance for personal purposes.
Miss Arnott, of Lochgelly, Fife, appeared before the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) conduct and competence committee in Edinburgh.
A three-member panel heard that Miss Arnott, who joined the SAS in 1999, had been allocated a doctor’s urgent call to attend the home of a depressed and suicidal woman and take her to a psychiatric hospital in Kirkcaldy.
Rowena Rix, representing the HCPC, said: ‘The control room supervisor reported to the duty shift manager that there had been a delay in Miss Arnott’s crew responding to this call. She admitted she had stopped the ambulance en route to the urgent call in order to undertake some personal shopping.’
The paramedic had acted unprofessionally and had put her own interests before those of the patient, Miss Rix added.
Duty shift manager Iain Morgan told the panel that investigations showed the ambulance had deviated
‘The idea is beyond belief’
from its route for about seven minutes. ‘I spoke to Victoria and she informed me she picked up something to do with her computer,’ he said.
Miss Rix asked: ‘In your experience, is it ever acceptable to stop en route to an urgent call?’ ‘No, it’s not,’ Mr Morgan said. Alice Stobart, for Miss Arnott, suggested there was a procedure for paramedics to stop on the way to calls and that others had been authorised to do so in the past.
‘There isn’t any procedure to allow that,’ Mr Morgan said. ‘I can only say in my experience that’s not the case. They would not be allowed to do it while en route to a call.’
The incident happened on July 4 last year. The call was at the second lowest level of priority, with a response window of one to four hours. It was received by the control room at 11.41am and allocated to Miss Arnott’s crew at 3.35pm.
Miss Arnott told the hearing she had stopped to buy medication as she had been feeling unwell.
She said: ‘I had been particularly poorly throughout the shift. I had reached a point where I was feeling frustrated and distracted.’
She felt she ‘needed medication to alleviate the symptoms to allow me to finish the shift’.
Miss Arnott said she told Mr Morgan she had gone to pick up a part for her computer so colleagues would not be alerted to the fact she had a health issue.
She later said to workmates she felt ‘totally mortified and completely humiliated’ by the incident.
She told the hearing: ‘I think I had realised how much I had failed my own expectations of myself.
‘But the patient was happy with the service she received. Everyone at the hospital was happy despite my very grave error.’
Miss Stobart said: ‘She accepts she fell below her own standards.’
Miss Rix said: ‘She caused a delay in the treatment of that patient and though there was no suggestion of any harm, there was potential.’
The hearing is expected to last two days, after which the panel will rule on whether misconduct has been proved and, if so, whether Miss Arnott’s fitness to practise is impaired.
The SAS said Miss Arnott was no longer an employee.
Scottish Tory health spokesman Jackson Carlaw said: ‘The idea that paramedics can take care of personal business while a patient waits for a response is beyond belief.’