ATCEMS Open Data Catalog
Austin-Travis County EMS contributes a number of tables to
the City of
Austin Open Data portal. The data in these tables are available to
the public for use in research, presentations, or app development. These tables
serve as the data source for many of the performance measures presented in our
dashboards.
This catalog describes the data that ATCEMS publishes to the Open Data portal. It will be updated as new data sets are added, or as existing tables are modified. If you have questions, contact the EMS Data Analysis team.
General Purpose Data Sets
These are tables that we update on a regular basis – either
monthly or quarterly. They describe
various aspects of department operations and services. The data presented in these tables are used
for the reports and dashboards we publish.
The following sections describe each table, including data
sources and limitations. Each section includes a link to the Open Data table.
Incidents by Month
An incident is an event for which someone requests
assistance from ATCEMS – generally through a 911 call. Incidents
per Month is a primary measure of demand for service.
This table contains incident counts for each month, broken
out by location (City of Austin, Travis County, or Other) and response priority
(Priority 1 through 5). Response time performance, reported as a percentage of
incidents meeting response time goals, is included for each priority and
location.
Data come from the Department’s Computer Aided Dispatch
system. It includes all incidents received through the Emergency Communications
center. Pre-scheduled activities such as special event standbys (e.g. Austin
City Limits festival, Austin Marathon, etc.) are not included in this data
set. Records are available starting from October 2010.
Ambulance Responses per Month
Each incident results in one or more ambulance responses,
based on the number of patients and other factors at the scene. Response counts
help us track the Department’s workload on an on-going basis.
This table contains response counts for each month, broken
out by location. Data are limited to regularly scheduled ambulances; units that
are not ambulances, or that work on an irregular basis are not included in this
table.
Data come from the Department’s Computer Aided Dispatch
system. Records are available starting from October 2010.
Patient Contacts per Month
A patient is someone who receives assistance from our
personnel. Generally, this involves assessing them, providing treatment, and
taking them to an emergency room for continuing care. Patient Contacts are another measure of Department workload.
This table contains counts of patients encountered each
month, broken out by location (City of Austin, Travis County, or Other). It also contains counts of patients transported
by the Department, also broken out by location. The final section of the table
contains patient transport rates – that is, the percent of all patients
contacted who are taken to the hospital. When calculating transport rates, we
do not include patients who are determined to be deceased on scene, since they
are not eligible for transport.
Data come from the Department’s electronic patient care
record system. Records are available starting from October 2010.
Patient Transport Destinations
ATCEMS transports patients to seventeen hospitals and three
free-standing emergency departments in Central Texas. This table contains the
count of patients transported to each facility every month, going back to
October 2010. The table includes a destination of Other/Missing for
cases where data is either absent, incorrect, or reflects transport to another
facility such as transport to a Bastrop hospital following a mutual aid response
into Bastrop County.
Data come from the Department’s electronic patient care
record system.
Quarterly Clinical Measures – STEMI Alert
STEMI is short for
“S-T Elevated Myocardial Infarction,” a common type of heart attack that our
paramedics are trained to identify and treat.
These emergencies are extremely time sensitive – STEMI patients need
rapid interventions and transport to specialty hospitals that can quickly
provide definitive care for this condition.
This table contains data related to our treatment of STEMI
patients. Indicators include patient
counts, aspirin administration, compliance with scene time targets, and
transport to specialty centers. Data are aggregated on a quarterly basis due to relatively small monthly patient counts.
Data come from the Department’s electronic patient care
record system and computer-aided dispatch system. Records are available
starting from October 2013.
Quarterly Clinical Measures – Stroke Alert
Stroke is a condition where blood flow in the brain has been
interrupted due to a blockage or bleeding.
These emergencies are very time-sensitive, since injury to brain tissue
can begin within minutes of onset. There
is little that our medics can do to treat these patients. They need rapid assessment and transport to
specialty hospitals that can quickly provide definitive diagnosis and care.
This table contains data related to our treatment of stroke
patients. Indicators include patient
counts, assessment procedures, compliance with scene time targets, and
transport to specialty centers. Data are aggregated on a quarterly basis due to relatively small monthly patient counts.
Data come from the Department’s electronic patient care
record system and computer-aided dispatch system. Records are available starting
from October 2013.
Quarterly Clinical Measures – Trauma Alert
Trauma Alert
refers to patients who meet criteria for transport to a Trauma Center based on
their vital signs or location and type of injury. These patients often need rapid surgical
intervention to minimize the effects of their wounds.
This table contains data related to our treatment of trauma
patients. Indicators include patient
counts, compliance with scene time targets, and transport to trauma
centers. Data are aggregated on a
quarterly basis due to relatively small monthly patient counts.
Data come from the Department’s electronic patient care
record system and computer-aided dispatch system. Records are available
starting from October 2013.
Quarterly Call to Door Intervals
Call-to-door
interval measures the time between a 911 call and arrival of the patient at the
hospital. We track this time for
patients with time sensitive conditions: STEMI, strokes, and serious injuries. This indicator tells us how well the parts of our response
system work together to meet the needs of these groups.
This table contains call-to-door performance for each of the
alert groups, and for all three groups as a whole. Data are aggregated on a quarterly basis due
to relatively small monthly patient counts.
Data come from the Department’s electronic patient care
record system and computer-aided dispatch system. Records are available
starting from October 2013.
Quarterly Cardiac Arrest Measures
Treatment of cardiac arrest patients is one of the most
common indicators used in measuring EMS system performance. This table contains data related to cardiac
arrest resuscitations.
Data come from the Department’s electronic patient care
record system. Records are available starting from October 2013.
Quarterly OMD Clinical Performance Indicators
The Austin/Travis County EMS System Office of the Medical
Director (OMD) uses a series of clinical performance indicators to assess
overall EMS system performance. We also
use these indicators as part of individualized feedback we provide to our field
personnel.
This table contains data for all seven OMD clinical
indicators. Data come from the
Department’s electronic patient care record system and computer-aided dispatch
system. Records are available starting from October 2013.
Communications Measures
The ATCEMS Communications Center is the first point of
contact with our Department for people having an emergency. Communications
Medics ensure that the right help arrives at the right place at the right
time. They also provide instructions to
callers, allowing the public to become the first first responders, until public
safety personnel arrive on the scene.
This table contains data related to Communications Center
performance, including 911 call volume, call answer and processing time, and
compliance with national standard performance metrics. The data come from the computer-aided
dispatch system, and systems used to monitor and evaluate call-taking
performance. Records are available
starting from October 2013.
Finance Measures
ATCEMS bills for services, using a rate structure approved
by the Austin City Council. Revenues are
returned to the General Fund, reducing the cost to the City and County of
providing EMS coverage.
This table contains data related to revenue collection,
aggregated by month. Data come from the
Department’s accounts receivable management system. Records are available
starting from October 2013.
Fleet Maintenance
Fleet reliability is a key component of the department’s
ability to provide timely care to the community. Preventative maintenance
prevents unit failures or unanticipated repairs, thereby ensuring dependable
fleet operation, which leads in turn to consistent department response and
transport capabilities.
This table contains data on maintenance of the department
response fleet – ambulances, command trucks, and utility vehicles. It includes
the number of vehicles due for preventative maintenance each month, and the
percentage that are serviced. The data are broken out by the three vehicle
types in addition to describing overall performance.
Data are provided by the City of Austin Fleet Services
department, and verified by the ATCEMS Fleet Manager. Data are available from
October 2012.
Customer Satisfaction by Month
ATCEMS conducts phone surveys of all patients or their
family members for whom the department has a valid phone number. The survey is
performed within 72 hours of department contact with the patient.
This table contains data describing patient satisfaction
with ATCEMS services in response to a question posed in the survey, aggregated
by month. Records are available starting
from October 2013.
Special Purpose Data Sets
We publish a number of data sets into the Open Data portal
to support initiatives such as the publication of our Annual Report. Once published, these data sets are not
updated. They may be deprecated without notice as needs change. This section lists those
tables; for more information on them, check the metadata published with the
table in the Open Data portal.