Hospital action delayed by miscommunication

Jace Radke

Wednesday, April 7, 2004 | 11:08 a.m.

A communication breakdown slowed a helicopter crew from getting a 6-year-old girl into Sunrise Hospital's emergency room Tuesday, although hospital officials and the helicopter flight nurse say the delay didn't contribute to the girl's death.

The girl, Kathryn Alexis Natali, 6, of Las Vegas, was pulled out of a Henderson pool, flown to Sunrise and died in the emergency room.

"It was a day when Murphy's Law prevailed and there was a communication issue on both sides," said Rick Wilbur, a Mercy Air flight nurse who was on the flight. "We'll talk to the hospital and they'll talk with us and maybe we'll come up with another backup to try to make sure this doesn't happen again."

The hospital and Mercy Air would not speculate how long the helicopter was on the hospital roof before hospital staff was able to get upstairs to bring the girl to the emergency room.

"We log times and Mercy Air logs times, and there is an ongoing investigation to determine how long it was," Sunrise spokeswoman Cheryl Smith said.

Smith called reports by KLAS Channel 8 that the girl waited as long as five minutes, "speculation."

Channel 8's helicopter filmed the scene and showed the crew turn off the engine and the nurse throw up his arms in frustration. The TV station timed the wait, and the report said it usually takes about two minutes for a hospital crew to get the patient.

The Clark County Coroner's Office said the girl died in the hospital emergency room.

The normal procedures for Mercy Air helicopters bringing patients to area hospitals includes Mercy Air dispatchers notifying the hospital that a patient is on the way.

A series of factors came together to prevent that from happening, Wilbur said.

The Mercy Air crew was at a Henderson park near a police standoff with a helicopter standing by in case an officer or the barricaded suspect was hurt, Wilbur said.

"A Henderson firefighter with a handheld radio ran over and said they were bringing a patient to us, and a minute later the patient was there and we were on our way," Wilbur said. "That call came directly from the fireman and didn't go through our dispatch."

While paramedics attended to the patient in the back of the helicopter, the pilot was using the helicopter's satellite radio to try to contact dispatch, but couldn't get through, Wilbur said.

At the same time the paramedics were using another radio system in the back of the helicopter to talk to emergency doctors at Sunrise, relaying the patient's condition, Wilbur said.

About 800 patients a year are delivered to Sunrise Hospital.