By Brandi Makuski and Patrick Lynn
At least a few times each month, our newsroom receives queries about emergency calls seen by members of the general public on a smartphone app called PulsePoint.
There’s no doubt that the popularity of social media—Facebook in particular—has given everyone a chance to share information about emergencies, perceived or real. Often, these contain assumptions based on what they might be seeing on the PulsePoint app; or third-hand information from someone else who misunderstood what they see on this app.
So we’re breaking it down for you.
The PulsePoint AED app, available for free download on Android and Apple devices, displays real-time medical and fire emergencies reported to dispatchers at the Portage Co. Communications Center.
Pulsepoint was born in 2010. Richard Price, fire chief in the San Ramon Valley, Cali., was eating in a restaurant on his day off when he heard sirens and saw one of his own department’s engines arrive out front. Their response was requested when someone next door collapsed and went into cardiac arrest.
Price was CPR-certified and carried a defibrillator in his car, and later said he could have responded much faster if he had known about the emergency.
It left Price seeking a solution to help connect registered first responders with people experiencing a cardiac emergency. Hence, the PulsePoint app was born, and two years later it became an award-winning public safety application.
In 2019, Portage Co. became one of the 4,200+ communities connected to PulsePoint. County leaders struck a deal with Mid-State Technical College wherein the two entities would jointly fund the necessary software, and maintain the county’s presence within the app.
While PulsePoint is a public, non-profit organization, it’s designed for registered first responders, not the general public. Those with the qualifications and training can log into a subscriber-only section of the app and obtain to-the-minute details on a medical emergency in their area.
We do hear that some local landlords find it useful to help keep tabs on their properties. Others in the general public also find it useful to keep current with emergencies in their neighborhood.
But PulsePoint is just one of many tools needed to put the details into context (and Facebook is not among those tools). Here’s why: The type of call shown in PulsePoint is typically how it was described, under a general heading, by the 911 caller. It does not show what’s happening when emergency crews arrive on the scene. It can be completely different from what’s been called in.
For the general public, a “medical emergency” can mean anything from a bad case of the flu to a broken leg to a heart attack. Only the medics and law enforcement responding to a scene, or a registered first responder, have access to the details.
Also, sometimes, a “fire” call isn’t really a fire. It could be an actual fire. It could also be a false alarm, an accidental activation of a pull station, a malfunction of a building’s sprinkler system, construction dust, or—more often than anything else—burnt food.
Participating agencies have several options for what information is publicly displayed. In Portage Co., only fire and EMS calls are shown, along with which fire and EMS units are responding. Up until late 2021, the app also showed the squad number(s) of local law enforcement responding to a scene. But area chiefs felt that could be putting officers in jeopardy, so law enforcement information is no longer included in the public display.
But requests for a medic response are not always listed on PulsePoint, either. Once on the scene of an incident, law enforcement may request that dispatchers send a fire/EMS unit because they’ve encountered a person in need of medical care.
Sometimes, when law enforcement encounters a person threatening violence against themselves or others, they ask paramedics to stage (park) at a nearby location so they can access the level of that person’s threat, and possibly disarm them before medics come into the mix.
These types of calls are not always listed on the PulsePoint app.
What you see on PulsePoint are only the fire/EMS units that were dispatched. If the scene is still active, there are color codes assigned to which units are en route, which are on the scene, and which ones have left the scene.
The point we’re trying to make is, PulsePoint doesn’t show many of the details one needs to definitively say, “‘X’ has happened.”
Trained journalists in the area have familiarized themselves with how this app works, but only through four years of experience. Unfortunately, this app was introduced to the community as something that was available to the public, but without any training or education to help the community understand how it works.
We use PulsePoint in conjunction with many other tools at our disposal to help report fact-based news to this community. But for those who wish to utilize PulsePoint, we hope this helps you understand how it works.
