
Freedom House Ambulance Service - Anon84
https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/freedom-house-ambulance-service/
======
rbecker
A brief glance at
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_ambulance](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_ambulance)
shows this wasn't even close to the first ambulance service, and I don't
understand how this myth could have started. Using a strict definition of
ambulance and paramedic, they're predated by at least a century:

 _Edward Dalton, a former surgeon in the Union Army, was charged with creating
a hospital in lower New York; he started an ambulance service to bring the
patients to the hospital faster and in more comfort, a service which started
in 1869. These ambulances carried medical equipment, such as splints, a
stomach pump, morphine, and brandy, reflecting contemporary medicine. [..] For
the first week of their operation, the ambulances were crewed by the hospital
's house-staff, after which the hospital hired Drs. Duncan Lee and Robert
Taylor as full-time ambulance surgeons; [..] Shortly before World War II,
then, a modern ambulance carried advanced medical equipment, was staffed by a
physician, and was dispatched by radio._

~~~
DanBC
Doctors are doctors, they're not paramedics. These men were trained to provide
healthcare but were not doctors.

It's somewhat tedious that whenever an article claims a black man, or a woman,
were first in something someone will leap in with "well, actually...",
especially when their well actuallys are often wrong.

Any history of _paramedics_ starts in the 1960s. eg this:
[https://www.emsworld.com/article/219388/timeline-modern-
amer...](https://www.emsworld.com/article/219388/timeline-modern-american-ems)

> 1966—Release of the “white paper,” Accidental Death and Disability: The
> Neglected Disease of Modern Society. In Belfast, Northern Ireland, Dr. Frank
> Pantridge begins delivery of prehospital coronary care using ambulances.

> 1967—The American Medical Association hosts the National Conference on
> Emergency Medical Services, which produces recommendations for training
> ambulance personnel. The Freedom House program begins in Pittsburgh.

If we're really using strict definitions for paramedic, here's what OED says
(paramedic 1 is about medics literally parachuting in during war time):

> paramedic 2

> (pɶrəˈmɛdɪk)[f. paramedic(al a. 1 and n. (cf. medic a. and n.).]

> paramedic 2

> A paramedical worker; = paramedical n. Also attrib. or as adj.

> 1970: Time 9 Nov. 38 “More than 40 training programs for doctors assistants
> are under way across the country. The graduates..are tagged with clumsy
> names—paramedic, clinical associate, health practitioner.”

> ibid., “Paramedic studies are wide-ranging—from community health to
> bacteriology and psychosomatic medicine, plus techniques such as regulating
> intravenous infusions and operating respirators.”

> 1974: Telegraph (Brisbane) 27 Feb. 32/2 “Paramedics tried artificial
> respiration, but to no avail.”

> 1974: Aiken (S. Carolina) Standard 22 Apr. 4-A/1 “Paramedic Services and the
> city police will provide first aid and protection during the walk.”

> 1975: Daily Tel. 29 Sept. 3/1 “The Lancet report gives details of 600 such
> operations, 366 performed by medical auxiliaries or `paramedics' as they are
> described. The rest were carried out by qualified doctors.”

> 1976: Amer. Speech 1973 XLVIII. 195 “Also of invaluable help to the nurse
> are the paramedic personnel, frequently shortened to paramedics. In their
> ranks we find those employees trained to read slides in the laboratory or to
> assist the doctor and nurse with other medical tasks.”

> 1976: Sci. Amer. Sept. 72/3 (Advt.), “Heart pacemakers, paramedic telecare
> units and ultrasonic cardioscopes—all are outgrowths of space technology.”

> 1977: It May 21/2 “They also have a fully-equipped ambulance, manned by
> State-certified paramedics and emergency medical technicians.”

~~~
rbecker
> It's somewhat tedious that whenever an article claims a black man, or a
> woman, were first in something someone will leap in with "well,
> actually...", especially when their well actuallys are often wrong.

I assure you it's equally tedious when an article expects me to believe (as
the entire 5th article strongly implies) that something as obvious and common
as an ambulance staffed with medical professionals didn't exist until 1966,
and the whole world used police and fire trucks to transport the injured, when
I can so easily find earlier examples.

What am I to make of all the examples in the wiki article I linked? Do they
not count, because they used doctors and not _paramedics_? Is that where my
"well actually" is wrong? If so, the article sure does its best to hide that
fact.

And what was the rest of the world up to during this time? Were the Soviet
union's eyes on Pittsburgh to learn how to handle medical emergencies? If so,
they must have been watching _very_ closely, because 8 years earlier
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UAZ](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UAZ):

 _In 1958, UAZ began production of the UAZ-450 series of trucks and vans. The
first model was the 450A ambulance; with room for two stretchers and four-
wheel drive, it was arguably the best in the world for use in remote areas._

An ambulance. The "best in the world", implying it was not the first
ambulance. I'm sure there's plenty others, for example in Europe, they just
don't have an article on 99percentinvisible.org

~~~
DanBC
> that something as obvious and common as an ambulance

They're not talking about ambulances. They're talking about paramedics.

Here's the para:

"The two men weren’t doctors, and they weren’t nurses. And their strange
uniforms weren’t hospital issued. Moon was witnessing the birth of a new
profession—one that would go on to change the face of emergency medicine. The
two men were some of the world’s first paramedics, and, like Moon, they were
Black."

Here's the fifth para:

> As a result, emergency services were not there to provide treatment at the
> scene or even necessarily on the way to the hospital… they were just about
> getting you to the hospital as quickly as possible. It also wasn’t clear
> whose responsibility it was to rush to the scene of an accident. Oftentimes
> firefighters were the ones to respond, and they were expected to deal with
> health treatment themselves. In other areas, the responsibility for
> transporting patients often fell to local funeral homes. In many major
> cities, this crucial task fell to another municipal service that probably
> had even less business responding to medical emergencies: The police.

Here's the wikipedia page on early ambo services, and history of pre-hosptial
care:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paramedic#Early_ambulance_serv...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paramedic#Early_ambulance_services)

> What am I to make of all the examples in the wiki article I linked? Those
> examples are about patient conveyance, not pre-hospital care. Those doctors
> are not providing pre-hospital care, they're getting the patient to hospital
> as fast as possible and then giving a hand-over.

> Do they not count, because they used doctors and not paramedics?

When we're talking about the first paramedics we do count paramedics and we
don't count medics, because medics are medics, they're not paramedics, which
is why we call them "medic", not "paramedic".

~~~
rbecker
In other words, the only thing Freedom House did that was different was
training non-doctors, while before (and elsewhere) doctors were used.

That the article heavily and _falsely_ implies neither ambulances nor doctors
were used (the 5th paragraph, that you quoted) is just a poor choice of words
by the author, not deliberate deception, right?

