[honeychile]

We've had both good and bad experiences with 911. When my daddy had an abdomenal anuerysm (we didn't know at the time), he just stood up and said, "I'm having the worst pain of my life!" then collapsed. My mother started called 911, and the operator was slow as molasses, so after giving her their address, she hung up to give my daddy CPR. The operator called back to say, "Don't you EVER hang up on us!" to which my mother responded, "I'm giving him CPR - send an ambulance!" and hung up again. As it was, my daddy had close to 90# on my mother, so she was trying to get him on the bed, too.

When my mother had her first heart attack, I called 911, and they were there in a flash. I told the paramedics what her symptoms were, and that she usually went to a hospital across town. They were calmly getting her ready for the ambulance, and said to me, "Can you still get in touch with your brother?" I said yes, and they said, "Tell him we're going to St. Clair. We don't have the time to go to UPMC," still calmly. I was so impressed by their professionalism, I wrote a letter of commendation to them afterwards. She was technically DOA, but because of their speed and wisdom, my mother is still with us (another heart attack and 4 surgeries later!).

What totally ticked me off was the amount of people who did NOT pull over, even with the ambulance's loud speaker and a police escort!