Austin-Travis County Emergency Medical Services Responds to Drowning Incidents

Austin-Travis County Emergency Medical Services has released a report analyzing 6 years of A-TCEMS data on drowning incidents (those under 19 yrs of age) here in Central Texas. This was a collaborative effort with David Zane (Injury Epidemiologist with Austin/Travis County Health & Human Services), Doug Ballew (Austin/Travis County HHS), Captain Randy Chhabra of Austin Travis County EMS, Alissa Magrum (Executive Director of Colin’s Hope), and others, and is the beginning of more work together.

While the report only looks at drowning data when EMS was called or involved, it provides interesting insights into the types of drownings and that are occurring and where, looks at whether lack of supervision was a contributing factor, and recommends layers of protection (as Colin’s Hope recommends) in order to prevent drowning.

You can find the report here, or copy & paste the following link into your browser:  http://www.colinshope.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/EMS_drowningFINAL-report.pdf.