Agency’s Role in Death to Be Probed

December 22, 2008

D.C. Fire Chief Dennis L. Rubin has asked the city’s inspector general to investigate his agency’s handling of an emergency call in which a Northeast Washington man complaining of chest pains and trouble breathing died hours after paramedics told him he had acid reflux and did not take him to a hospital.

Edward L. Givens was not breathing when a relative found him lying in a hallway in the early morning of Dec. 3. Paramedics who responded to a 911 call at the family home about six hours earlier instructed Givens to take an over-the-counter antacid for what they assessed as acid reflux and left, family members said.

Givens’s mother, Lolitha Givens, said she wanted her son taken to the hospital but that paramedics said he did not need to go. “It was the department’s view that, because of the public scrutiny in this case, it required us to seek an outside, independent review,” said Alan Etter, a spokesman for the D.C. Fire and Emergency Medical Services Department.

Read Article: Washington Post

Posted By: Phoenix DUI Attorney