“With the patient’s life on the line, I was running up and down ‘Dreihausgasse’ street until I finally realized the caller had said ‘Dreyhausengasse’.”
This was a terrifying reality for RapidSOS team member Reinhard Ekl when he was an EMT in Austria. For years, Reinhard spent many nights and weekends on 9-1-1 transport ambulances, responding to emergency calls. Looking back, Reinhard can pinpoint many times when RapidSOS Haven could have had a huge impact on getting people the help they needed.
The Challenge
A frequent problem that Reinhard recognized was that many callers did not speak German and thus were not able to properly articulate their precise location to the call taker. Reinhard and his team would frequently have to spend several precious minutes trying to find the precise location of the emergency because of the language barrier between the caller and the call taker.
Reinhard recalls spending 10 minutes knocking on doors on “Dreihausgasse” Street until he figured out that the caller was in fact on “Dreyhausengasse” Street – a few miles away from where the EMTs were vigorously searching.
The Solution: Haven
In Reinhard’s own words, “With RapidSOS, the caller’s address would have been instantly communicated to the dispatch center, and this mix-up would never have happened!”
Serving as an EMT for 10 years and coming from Stanford University and Google, we are excited to have Reinhard on our team, with his insight, experience and passion for saving lives!