False Negatives and Negative Comments

I spotted this thread on facebook today… https://www.facebook.com/sincitymedic/posts/925704744131170

“My county has six volunteer/paid on call rescue squads. Only one or two are staffed @ the ALS level. When 911 EMD sends a BLS rig to a chest pain or difficulty breathing call (or any ALS call) in their own district, the closest ALS truck from another district is automatically dispatched as well. When the BLS crew arrives on scene, it is able to cancel the ALS rig prior to its arrival, if the EMTs decide Paramedics are not needed. Should this be allowed? I'm interested in learning if this is common practice elsewhere.”

Here’s what I posted in reply:

“To break this down... BLS cancelling ALS will result in a small but non-zero number of false negatives. BLS not allowed to cancel ALS will result in a very large number of false positives. False negatives have an obvious cost, but false positives can have a cost too, in the more serious calls that the ALS unit will be delayed from reaching.

If you are in an EMS system that is blessed with an overabundance of ambulances and never has any delays getting them to a patient, than the cost of false positives can be ignored. But I suspect nobody posting here has ever seen such a system, let alone worked in it.”

I think it’s mostly true. Probably doesn’t go far enough, but I wanted to stick with what couldn’t be contradicted. Unfortunately I think it will be lost and ignored… you see, this thread has developed a bad comment problem.

“Don’t read the comments” is usually good advice. In the case of a question post the comments are the only reason you’re there… but here they get bogged down quick. People stake out their positions early and refuse to change… people ignore evidence presented to them… people advance their claims without evidence.

It’s the same basic problem discussed in this podcast here: https://lueepodcast.wordpress.com/2015/02/16/episode-93-skeptics-and-social-media/

and commented upon by me here: https://www.facebook.com/LUEEPodcast/posts/769300263123311

This seems to be a common problem on the internet. Really, though, it’s a problem everywhere. I think it just flourishes a lot more when people aren’t forced by circumstances to maintain the thin veneer of civilization. Either by needing to work together or else just by being in public view and wanting to seem civil.

Some people, of course, never seem to realize that the cameras are on. But that’s another problem.