Emergency Dispatch: Quo Vadis? (Where are you going?)

Emergency Dispatch is a process of making split-second decisions that concern the immediate health and safety of others, including situations of life and death. This process requires a proper dispatch environment, emergency infrastructure, and process management. Recent scientific research offers insights that can and should be applied and implemented in the field of Emergency Dispatch. Since a Public Safety Access Point (PSAP) is expected by the public to be a high-reliability organization, it has to be engineered as such; both humans and machines are quintessential components in achieving this reliability. Scientific research relevant to high-reliability organizations is usually conducted in sectors yielding substantial influence on societies, such as the energy industry. These principles and mechanisms are entirely applicable to Emergency Dispatch 1 . A high-reliability organization is an organization that has succeeded in avoiding catastrophes in an environment where normal accidents can be expected due to risk factors and complexity 2 . Emergency Dispatch is a complex and time-critical process