National Headquarters
Fire and Emergency New Zealand
National Headquarters
Spark Central, Level 7
42-52 Wil is Street
Wel ington Central
Wel ington 6011
Phone +64 4 496 3600
22 December 2023
K Thompson
By email: [FYI request #25144 email]
Tēnā koe K Thompson
Information Request – Data on medical callouts
Thank you for your information request dated 12 December 2023 asking for information relating
to Fire and Emergency New Zealand attending medical callouts
.
In accordance with the provisions of the Official Information Act 1982 (OIA), we outline and
answer each aspect of your request, below. Please note the questions are not listed in the order
you have provided in your request.
1. Please can you let us know the number of medical emergencies you have attended per month
over the last five years?
2. Please can you break down the emergency medical cal outs you have attended into types of
medical emergency (eg heart attack, cardiac arrest, etc).
3. How many of these medical emergencies end sadly in death?
4. What percentage of Fire and Emergency cal outs are for medical emergencies per month for the
last five years?
Please see pages one and two on the document enclosed. This table shows the total number of
medical incidents we have been called to, by month since January 2019. Also included in this table
is the number of incidents that resulted in a fatality, and medical incidents as a percentage in
relation to the total incident count for that month.
Fire and Emergency do not record the type of medical emergency, as this will likely be held with
the ambulance service that attended as the lead agency for medical callouts. We do however
record the ambulance priority colour codes which provide a high-level indication of the possible
diagnosis. We also attach the St John New Zealand priority definitions which is detailed in the Fire
and Emergency and St John Memorandum of Understanding (MOU). This will help you identify
what each colour represents.
5. Please can you cite the numbers of medical emergency cal outs per week for the last five years.
Please see pages three and four for a breakdown of medical incidents by week of the year. We can
also advise that our personnel are called to an average of 237 medical incidents per week.
link to page 2
6. Do medical emergencies that Fire and Emergency NZ attend tend to cluster in groups or cluster
on some days or weeks, or are they evenly spread out through time?
Please see page five for statistics on medical incidents by day of week.
7. Does Fire and Emergency NZ transport people with medical emergencies to hospital?
Our fleet is not properly resourced with the required vehicles/ambulances) to transport patients.
In some instances, the medical responders (St John or Wellington Free Ambulance) can request
our assistance to drive their vehicle while they stabilise a patient and we can also assist by driving
an ambulance at normal road speed and where this is agreed the firefighter will be returned to
their station or place of work by St John. In these instances, it is still Fire and Emergency drivers
assisting them to transport patients.
Section 2.4 of the MOU
1 with St John outlines what transportation restrictions apply to medical
support responses by Fire and Emergency.
8. Is there a regional pattern in the types of medical emergencies you attend? For example, do
certain areas have more heart attacks, say, than others?
9. Do some ethnicities tend to experience more medical events that you attend than others?
As previously mentioned, Fire and Emergency do not report on the type of medical emergency.
We also do not record the patients’ demographics for medical emergencies. Consequently, your
request for this information is refused under section 18(e) of the OIA, as the information does not
exist.
You have the right to seek an investigation and review by the Ombudsman of this decision.
Information about how to make a complaint is available
at www.ombudsman.parliament.nz or
freephone 0800 802 602.
Note also that this response (with your personal details removed) may be published on the Fire
and Emergency website.
Nāku noa nā
Ethan Fett
Acting Manager Information Requests
1 Link to MOU
- Fire and Emergency St John MOU.pdf (fyi.org.nz), see page 10.
