Family Sues City Over Death After Long Wait for Ambulance

A family has sued the District for failing to respond quickly to a medical emergency, saying that it took an ambulance about 90 minutes to pick up a relative who later died.

Cassandra Bailey, 38, of Northeast Washington went into cardiac arrest and died once she arrived at Washington Hospital Center on March 13, the lawsuit said. The hospital was five miles from a dialysis center where Bailey was receiving treatment, the suit says.

The suit, filed Tuesday in D.C. Superior Court, seeks $10 million on behalf of Bailey's brother and her 16-year-old daughter.

"Every time I see an ambulance or firetruck go by, I really get really angry," said her brother, Orlando Bailey, who is raising his niece. The girl's father died about four years ago.

The trouble began about 5:45 p.m. at the BMA Dialysis Center, in the 900 block of M Street SE. Bailey had suffered a sharp drop in blood pressure after her treatment. An employee at the center called 911 several times over a 90-minute period and was assured by an operator that an ambulance was on its way, the suit says.

Bailey's sister, Brenda Bailey, who was with her at the dialysis center, was told by a 911 operator not to take her to a hospital because the ambulance would be there momentarily, said the family's attorney, Ronald A. Karp.

The ambulance picked up Bailey, and her heart began to fail as she reached the hospital. The family says she got there about 7:30 p.m. and contends that she would have survived had she arrived sooner.

Alan Etter, a spokesman for the D.C. Fire and Emergency Medical Services Department, said the agency has corrected a problem with its "auto response" system, which tracks ambulances.

Etter said that a satellite system was tracking ambulances and alerting 911 operators when the vehicles were in motion and presumably headed to their destinations.

In Bailey's case, the ambulance was in motion, but it was headed back to the station. Because the satellite recorded the ambulance as in motion, the system assumed it was en route, Etter said. He said it is unclear why the driver apparently did not hear the call to pick up Bailey.

After an investigation into Bailey's case, the fire department now checks directly -- rather than relying on a satellite -- to determine whether ambulances are headed to their destinations, Etter said.

He said that the department and Fire Chief Adrian H. Thompson "were at the time, and continue to be, distressed by that situation. And our sincere condolences are with Ms. Bailey's family and friends."

Janice Quintana, spokeswoman for the Office of Unified Communications, which includes the 911 call center, declined to comment.

Bailey's death came less than three months after the botched emergency response in the case of retired New York Times reporter David Rosenbaum, who was beaten and robbed on a Northwest Washington street. Responders at first believed that Rosenbaum was drunk, and they did not recognize the seriousness of the situation; he later died. Rosenbaum's family filed a $20 million lawsuit against the city.