"Called 92 Times During Chuseok Holiday"... 30s Woman Suffers Cardiac Arrest Three Times, Ultimately

Called 92 Times... All Rejected
Death After Three Cardiac Arrests

On Chuseok Day last year, the fire department in Busan made 92 calls to hospitals to transfer a patient but failed to find a hospital for transfer, resulting in the patient's death. The photo shows the emergency room entrance of a university hospital in Chuncheon, Gangwon Province, on the afternoon of the 17th.
[Photo by Yonhap News]

It was revealed belatedly that on the day of last Chuseok, the fire authorities in Busan made 92 calls to hospitals to transfer a patient but ultimately failed to find a hospital for transfer, resulting in the patient's death.

According to the fire authorities' "Status Report on Delayed Transfer of Cardiac Arrest Patients," obtained by Rep. Yoon Gun-young of the National Assembly's Public Administration and Security Committee on the 23rd, a report was received at 2:15 a.m. on the 17th, Chuseok day, from a woman in her 30s complaining of convulsions and vomiting symptoms. When the paramedics arrived at the scene, Ms. A was in a state of impaired consciousness and classified as level 1, the highest severity level.

The Emergency Medical Situation Management Center also tried to find a treatment hospital by making calls, but all 10 hospitals in Busan city refused to accept her. Meanwhile, Ms. A went into cardiac arrest in the ambulance. She was transported to the emergency room of a nearby hospital, where she temporarily regained consciousness through cardiopulmonary resuscitation and drug administration, but that hospital also lacked medical equipment and had to transfer her to a higher-level hospital.

The fire authorities contacted three university hospitals in Busan city as well as Gyeongsang National University Hospital in Jinju, Gyeongnam, and Soonchunhyang University Hospital in Cheonan, Chungnam, which are in other regions, but received responses that acceptance was difficult due to a shortage of medical personnel.

After a total of 92 calls, unable to find a hospital, Ms. A experienced cardiac arrest three more times and eventually died around 6:25 a.m.

Earlier, the Ministry of Health and Welfare stated regarding the emergency room situation during this Chuseok holiday, "While there were cases where medical use was inconvenient when viewed individually, overall there seemed to be no major confusion." Prime Minister Han Duck-soo also expressed gratitude to the medical staff who stayed by patients during the Chuseok holiday at the Cabinet meeting on the 19th, saying that the feared "emergency room crisis" did not occur.

However, as cases emerged where patients could not find emergency rooms and ultimately died, criticism arose that "it is difficult to say that the emergency medical system has been normalized."