Medical emergency drill reveals an alarming scenario

Dubai: An emergency drill held at a five-star hotel illustrated the need for enough trained personnel to handle medical emergencies after staff failed two out of three scenarios.

Hotels in Dubai are advised to have an Automated External Defibrillator (AED), a life-saving device designed to measure heart rate and restart the heart, under a safety programme conducted by the Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing and the Department of Health and Medical Services (Dohms).

The drill, held at the Crowne Plaza Hotel yesterday by the Dohms ambulance department, involved several scenarios in which heart attacks were simulated to see how quickly hotel staff responded.

The response time for the first emergency was 20 minutes, the second seven minutes and the third five minutes.

In the first two scenarios, the staff could not immediately operate the AED as they were unauthorised to use it, although they could perform cardio-pulmonary resuscitation.

Head of training at Dohms said the problem stemmed from the lack of staff trained to use the AED.