The Dispatch Labs

When Alexander Graham Bell completed the first successful telephone call in 1876, he had been working on his invention for years. Even after this massive achievement, he wasn’t content to accept the world as it was but rather, he envisioned a more connected future and then did all he could to make it possible.

Bell knew such a massive shift in the culture and technology wouldn’t be easy. It would only come after hard work, experimenting with existing technology, and collaborating with other trailblazers. He founded Bell Labs to create a place where likeminded scientists, analysts, and creatives could come together to shape this new world.

A hundred-odd years after the founding of Bell Labs, when Dr. Jeff Clawson invented the Medical Priority Dispatch System^™ (MPDS^®) in the 1970s, someone asked him what vision he had for the future of the MPDS. Dr. Clawson answered, “I want to create the Bell Labs of Emergency Dispatch.”

He knew that the future of emergency response and telemedicine would be all the richer for incorporating ideas and opinions from people on every stop in the chain of survival. The IAED’s Dispatch Labs isn’t just about the protocols—it's a compilation of the people and systems in place to create and support them. It’s the data gathered and analyzed to make sure that people are receiving the right help in the right place at the right time. It’s the accreditation and quality assurance programs that ensure each call is answered with high compliance and care. It’s the boards and councils made up of experts from all areas of emergency response updating the protocols to align with industry standards.

The IAED’s Dispatch Labs is a place where the foremost concern is making this profession the best it can be. Through its specialization in and dedication to this field, its utilization and connection to community, and its constant striving for excellence and innovation, Dispatch Labs is building the future of emergency dispatch and maintaining the lead in evidence-based dispatch science and innovation.

Specialization
The International Academies of Emergency Dispatch^® (IAED^™) has forged its own path since its inception. In a time when emergency dispatchers once sat at a desk with a corded phone and the best of intentions, 911 protocols were not thought of—let alone held to a researched, trusted standard.

In 1979, IAED co-founder and Director of Science, Jeff Clawson, M.D., was an emergency room physician and medical director seeking to improve the emergency dispatch process by adopting a comprehensive, standardized approach to protocol.

With an eye on the emergency dispatcher’s role, the IAED built the organization it is today by setting standards to advance and support public safety through protocol. Brick by brick, the path ahead was laid through the Academy’s structure, research, and obvious impact.

Structure
After the release of the MPDS in 1979, the Council of Standards was created later in 1988 as the Academy’s expert body of research, development, and evidence-based standards (now applied to medical, fire, police, nurse triage, and quality assurance).

Shortly afterward, the IAED instituted its first Curriculum Board to develop instructional courses to train and certify protocol users, holding them to a higher role of professionalism with an established Code of Ethics (late 1980s) and additional Code of Conduct (2009).¹

Undoubtedly, these standards helped distinguish the role of Emergency Dispatchers—and their impact—as recognized today, far beyond the “glorified secretaries” of yesterday.

Currently, the IAED thrives with an astounding 17 Boards and Councils. The main governing bodies include the Board of Certification, Board of Accreditation, Curriculum Council, and Councils of Standards—each operating on thousands of volunteer hours each year as a member-driven effort to culminate the landscape of emergency dispatch.

“Our boards and councils have truly built the Academy, combining expertise that forms a worldwide perspective,” said Pam Stewart, Board of Certification Chair.

Priority Dispatch Corp.^™ (PDC^™) Public Safety Medical and Fire Specialist Gary Galasso has long been a champion of the Academy’s systems. “There is no Academy, no research, no advancement outside of the people who believe in it,” he said. “Today, we are capable of making life-critical changes at an immediate pace, offering two full version releases each year, which is a credit to the Academy’s structure. It’s far beyond a product. It’s a revolution.”

Clearly, the input of people with different professional backgrounds is a key ingredient in the secret sauce of the IAED’s collaboration.

“Without the input of structured boards and councils, the system can quickly become inbred,” said Mike Thompson, IAED Fire Protocol, Academics, and Standards Expert. “If only a few people were involved, the protocol would start to look like limited opinions and experiences and inevitably stagnate, but we take the opposite path—collaborating, testing, and evaluating each piece of user feedback for real-life application before releasing it to the public.”

Research
Leading with research and testing, the IAED has proved the legs it stands upon by analyzing emergency calls made to 911, 999, 000, 112, and other emergency numbers and proving and improving its own protocols through scientific, evidence-based processes. Equally important is the IAED’s commitment to investigate new dispatch methodologies, technologies, and techniques to improve emergency response efforts.

The IAED has authored over 200 published research-based articles (115 based on original research) including those found in Circulation, Annals of Emergency Medicine, Emergency Medical Journal, Resuscitation, Prehospital Emergency Care, Prehospital and Disaster Medicine, STROKE, and the IAED’s own peer-reviewed journal, the Annals of Emergency Dispatch and Response (AEDR).

Gaining real-life insights, they’ve conducted studies on lights-and-siren usage, out-of-hospital tourniquet usage, stroke diagnostic prediction, caller/bystander pulse check diagnostics, QA feedback, and their own Emergency Infectious Disease Surveillance (EIDS) Tool, among others.

As the science of emergency dispatch evolves, the IAED remains at its center, honoring Dr. Clawson’s vision of creating the Academy’s “Dispatch Labs,” proving the protocols through time-tested research.

Impact
It may be impossible to assess the impact of the IAED’s decades of protocol evolution and collaboration. To do so would be an exercise in measurement where the IAED is both the ruler and the scale. But a glimpse of Aurora 911 Emergency Communications (Colorado, USA) shows how difficult circumstances can prove the protocol.

Prior to her role as Director, Tina Buneta’s comm. center had gone live with the medical, fire, and police protocols at once in 2016. Though the medical and fire protocols’ launches were successful, Emergency Dispatchers’ experience with the Police Priority Dispatch System^™ (PPDS^®) was problematic due to less well-understood fluidity at that time, causing frustration. Rather than communicating the difficulty back to the IAED, the decision was made to “unplug” the Police Protocol.

Unfortunately, in August 2019, the center handled a tragic, high profile in-custody death of a young city resident. The aftermath soon revealed an angry, betrayed community. Soon Aurora911 was locked down in a pandemic with the city erupting in protests.

By August 2020, another police event triggered a wave of outrage, causing celebrities to encourage their social media followers to flood the emergency lines.

“Our team faced a week’s worth of call volume in 30 hours,” Buneta said. “Every incoming line was flooded with protesting calls, death threats, and comments no human being should hear.”

The Aurora Police Department (APD) found themselves in a consent decree issued by the Colorado State Attorney General to improve identified system and process deficiencies.

At the end of 2024, Aurora911 chose to reintroduce the PPDS. “This time, we built the system together,” Buneta said.

Jason Barbour, then Priority Dispatch Corp.^™ EPD Implementation and Client Support Specialist (now Vice President of Client Operations), addressed the team’s prior experience and fears of re-engaging the PPDS by introducing its increased flexibility, highlighting ECHO fast tracks, optional Jurisdictionally Approved Questions (JAQs), and offering needed customization.

“We are already seeing the wins in the data from using the PPDS,” Buneta said. “We were able to show our police chief how his department is successfully responding to critical moments of life and safety with consistency and accountability.”

Aurora911 now serves as an example of how protocol, leadership, and data can prove the system works when Emergency Dispatchers are brought in as part of the solution. The number of centers using the PPDS is now approaching 500.

Community
Perhaps one of the most unique aspects of the IAED is the combination of experts in each field devoted to the improvement of emergency dispatch processes.

Like a system of checks and balances, the IAED created the Proposal for Change (PFC) process as a foundation for maintaining the integrity of the protocol. PFCs give our expanding user base of 86,946 members a voice that’s heard, weighed, and shared round the world.

“The Academy is not an Academy of one,” Stewart said, alluding to the dilemma faced by lone medical directors having to research and evolve homegrown protocols. “But we have one unified, universally recognized protocol where a heart attack is handled the same way in Salt Lake City, Utah (USA), as it is anywhere else in the world. I can’t think of another organization who could claim to have what we have built.”²

Led by over 45 years of development, the IAED now leads the conversation in the sphere of 911. But we don’t do it alone.

Global presence
Today, the IAED is a global network with 4,333 agencies who have implemented the medical, fire, police, and/or nurse triage protocols. The IAED protocol systems are available in 32 languages and dialects and utilized in 61 countries including Malaysia, China, New Zealand, Australia, Brazil, Austria, the Netherlands, Italy, Lithuania, Qatar, Canada, and the United Kingdom.

Unlike other fully customizable protocols or systems based on data pulled by artificial intelligence, the IAED protocol systems remain standardized through years of unified evolution and growth among its users. This standardization enables consistent translation and unparalleled accuracy for reporting and analytical research conducted throughout the world.

“We really are international,” Stewart said. “Our various Cultural Committees work with the Councils of Standards to localize the protocols for reasonable language and culture-based issues. This combines a universal voice of authenticity with the localization needed for each protocol in each country.”

Conference connections
With a vision of real-world impact, the IAED created the NAVIGATOR conference to invite all roles across emergency dispatch to certify, present, network, and learn from each other. The first conference was held in 1996 at Snowbird, Utah (USA).

Though those first few sessions focused on certifying about 45 people, the venue soon was outgrown. The North America-based NAVIGATOR conference now features over 1,700 attendees each year.

Additionally, the IAED currently hosts six conferences dotting the globe. Emergency dispatch experts also congregate at Asia NAVIGATOR, Australasia NAVIGATOR, China NAVIGATOR, Euro NAVIGATOR, UK & Ireland NAVIGATOR, and Middle East NAVIGATOR.

“NAVIGATOR always has been about getting people who are passionate about the protocol into the same room,” Stewart said. “The connection of meeting face to face is important. From the exhibit hall welcome gala to the closing keynote, our attendees find others who share a like mindset and become good friends and mentors.”

Inevitably, these connections foster professional growth and opportunities. As the emergency dispatch industry evolves, these 911 professionals can share similar concerns, trends, and challenges, ultimately finding relatability and support.

Emergency Telecommunicator Course
Among the four pillars of the IAED (medical, fire, police, and emergency nurse triage), we must not neglect the IAED’s underlying focus that connects them all: the foundational Emergency Telecommunicator Course.

In 1998, the IAED was still growing from the revolutionary ideas of creating new structured protocol-based disciplines—fire and police protocols— and developing training that fully prepared Emergency Dispatchers to use them.

Dr. Clawson agreed with the plan to build a foundational Emergency Telecommunicator curriculum with a specific desire for the training to be engaging and edifying to a higher standard, setting a professional tone while uniting with the IAED’s protocol training.

Once the ETC course was in full force, the IAED found great applications for it, especially catering to a younger population of students such as high schoolers in career and technical education programs.

Upon graduation, ETC students could seek additional training and certification in discipline-specific emergency medical, fire, and/or police dispatch specialties to function on-line with earned confidence to handle each call for critical, life-sustaining assistance. Yet the impact goes beyond those who choose an Emergency Dispatch career.

“These ETC students not only have greater respect for first responders, but they also have an understanding of how emergencies are handled in the real world,” said Bonni Stockman, ETC Program Coordinator. “An estimated 18,374 members took the ETC course between 2024 and 2025, sharing what they learned with their communities.”

In recent years, the ETC course has enabled comm. centers to tap into non-traditional avenues for staffing solutions. They’ve led groups of refugees through ETC to enter a career that provides service to the community and stability for their families.

“This is the type of education that never goes unused,” Stockman said.
This year, the ETC program is celebrating 25 years of building the next generation of first, first responders. As we approach this silver anniversary, we appreciate ETC’s innovation, individuality, and impact throughout the world.

ESO partnership
In November 2025, the IAED announced a partnership with ESO Solutions to unlock the potential of connecting outcome data among emergency dispatch, responders, and hospital crews.

The main impetus driving this collaboration was the largest dispatch outcome study ever published, appearing in April 2024 in Prehospital Emergency Care.³

“The study links emergency calls and response assignments with ambulance care and hospital outcomes across a number of communities,” said ESO CEO Dr. Eric Beck. “That seminal piece of outcomes-based research was the proof of concept of what a research partnership could create.”

Tracking and analyzing patient outcome data in comparison to dispatch data sets could provide evidence for significant changes for a more informed, results-driven approach. Additionally, data trends may reveal opportunities for alternative care for some patients, potentially alleviating some of the strains on the emergency response system—both EMS and the emergency department.

ESO also has the ability to create a longitudinal patient record, looking at one patient over time and connecting records from multiple encounters and settings, forming a history that can provide a bigger picture of patient care.

“We can understand the patient’s full journey of months and years with three-dimensional data,” Beck said. “I often say that the world was flat until it was round. The world is round today. We are connected by data to help understand the journey of a patient over time, unlocking the opportunity to drive further improvements and outcomes.”

That’s where the IAED’s Data Center enters the scene with millions of emergency communication center records—from 377 medical agencies, 183 fire agencies, and 105 police agencies—showing call volumes, Chief Complaint types, response assignments, and call times. This immense database currently has over 31 million calls—and growing daily.

As ESO continues to add supporting hospitals and communities around the globe, your center can be part of the partnership by providing data you already collect. Express interest today to be part of an inaugural group spearheading the solution through connection by emailing brent.myers@eso.com.

Innovation
What separates progress that seems inevitable and reactionary from true innovation?

While the protocols themselves are innovative— they have been described as “living, breathing protocols” due to the fact that they are frequently updated in response to evidence-based research and to adapt to changing industry standards—there are certain key aspects and tools that stand out above the rest due to their prescient and trailblazing nature.

Stroke Diagnostic Tool
It’s a common saying in the medical profession that “time is brain” in the case of strokes. While the actual amount of brain damage accrued in the time a brain goes without oxygen is up for debate, strokes are a high-acuity event that require quick, precise response to ensure the best possible outcome.

The Stroke Diagnostic Tool was introduced to the MPDS in North America in 2010 after being released and used extensively in the U.K. for a year prior. The premise of the Tool was simple and elegant—the Emergency Dispatcher uses a three-question test to evaluate the likelihood that the patient is having a stroke. The patient is asked to smile to check for facial drooping, to raise their hands to check for weakness or paralysis on one side of the body, and then to repeat a simple phrase to identify any speech abnormalities. Responses indicate CLEAR, STRONG, PARTIAL, or NO evidence of a stroke, the information influencing what level of response the Emergency Dispatcher chooses for the most appropriate treatment.

In 2016, an article on the effectiveness of the Stroke Diagnostic Tool (SDxT) was published in the Journal of Stroke and Cerebrovascular Diseases by Dr. Clawson. The article stated that the Tool had “an 86.4% ability to effectively identify strokes among all hospital-confirmed stroke cases (sensitivity), and a 26.6% ability to effectively identify non-strokes among all hospital-confirmed non-stroke cases (specialty).”⁴ In other words, when it’s used correctly by Emergency Dispatchers, the SDxT saves a lot of brain.

Following the model of the protocol, the Tool itself is regularly updated, and multiple studies of its effectiveness have been conducted and published in the past decade from both the Academy and outside agencies. One of the most recent studies was conducted by representatives of the Montgomery County (Texas, USA) Hospital District EMS service, which “found a sensitivity of 87.2% […] and a specificity of 36.7%.” The results are similar to the 2016 findings, even a little bit higher, and the researchers suggest that “modifications to the SDxT in recent years have improved the predictive ability.”⁵

The Stroke Diagnostic Tool is a powerful technological advance that revolutionized the way Emergency Dispatchers handle this high-acuity situation, showcasing the type of inventions made by the Academy and Dispatch Labs.

High Risk Obstetrics Committee
Protocol 24: Pregnancy/Childbirth/Miscarriage is unique among its counterparts in the Protocol in that the Emergency Dispatcher must be able to pivot to a different question or instruction at any moment to keep pace with how the childbirth is progressing. For that flexibility to truly work, the Protocol must be clear, useful, and backed by research and experts.

The IAED recently revived its High Risk Obstetrics Committee as the result of an uptick of interest in midwifery and individual midwives reaching out to inquire about changing standards of practice. This “sub-council” is made up of representatives from the IAED, the Welsh Ambulance Services University NHS Trust (WAST), two obstetricians, a physician researcher, three midwives, and a consulting neonatologist.

This culmination resulted in major changes being made not only to Protocol 24: Pregnancy/Childbirth/ Miscarriage, but also Protocol F – Delivery. A study conducted by Dr. Laura Goodwin, a member of the Committee and its main researcher, found that over a three-year period, roughly 3,700 babies in the U.K. are born in a prehospital setting, and only 2.7% of babies had their temperature measurements recorded when the paramedics arrived on scene. Of that 2.7%, a staggering 72% were hypothermic on arrival at the hospital.⁶

It was clear that Protocol F – Delivery needed to strongly emphasize keeping the baby warm and that general advice such as “keep your baby warm” wasn’t sufficient. The protocol was revised to include clear, step-by-step instructions, ensuring that callers know exactly how to keep the newborn warm in stressful situations. Updates to Panel F-8 have the Emergency Dispatcher instruct the caller to remove any wet clothing from the mother’s belly and place the baby directly on her skin, covering the baby’s head with an infant cap, hat, blanket, or towel (but not its face). Additional instructions have the Emergency Dispatcher tell the caller to warm the room by closing or opening windows, turning on heaters, and turning off any fans.

While it’s important these changes were made in response to evidence-based research and changing industry standards, what’s more important is that they will continue to monitor the results of these changes.

The High Risk Obstetrics Committee meets regularly and upcoming considerations include deciding on a specific definition of “neonate” since it varies in the medical literature; a Sub-Chief Complaint for “lack of fetal movement;” a revisitation of CPR techniques for pregnant patients; better or continued confirmation of breathing of the baby after birth; and a Sub-Chief Complaint and instructions for people who have taken the morning-after pill or abortion pill and are experiencing adverse side effects.

The Academy and the High Risk Obstetrics Committee are already looking to the future to ensure that this protocol continually evolves, remains clinically safe, and acts in the best interest of women, babies, and their families.

Conclusion
When Alexander Graham Bell died in 1922, it’s unlikely he would have ever expected that his most famous invention would lead to a revolution in emergency response before the end of the century. But because he left Bell Labs behind as his legacy, he knew that no matter what happened, he had created an organization that would pursue knowledge and innovation with enthusiasm and passion that would in turn inspire others to take up that path with similar vigor.

While we can’t predict the future here at Dispatch Labs (not yet anyway), what we do know is that we won’t rest on past successes. Industry standards will continue to be updated, and technology will keep evolving beyond anything we can (yet) imagine.

We strive to make public safety and emergency response the best it possibly can be by ensuring that any technology implemented is in the best interests of the Emergency Dispatcher and the industry as a whole. Any new tools that are invented will be carefully examined to make sure they benefit the Emergency Dispatcher sitting at the console rather than making their already difficult job even more difficult.

No matter what curveballs are thrown at this crucial profession, Dispatch Labs will keep working hard, experimenting with existing technology, and creating bold solutions to seemingly insurmountable problems to make sure that we keep getting it right.

Sources
1. Stewart, P. “Road Map For the Profession.” Journal of Emergency Dispatch. 2022; March 30. iaedjournal.org/road-map-for-the-profession (accessed Feb. 2, 2026).

2. Clawson, J.J. “The DNA of Dispatch: The reasons for a unified medical dispatch protocol.” Journal of Emergency Medical Services. 1997; 22(5):55-57.

3. Levy, M.J., Crowe, R.P., Abraham, H., Bailey, A., Blue, M., Ekl, R., Garfinkel, E., Holloman, J.B., Hutchens, J., Jacobsen, R., Johnson, C., Margolis, A., Troncoso, R., Williams, J.G., Myers, J.B. “Dispatch Categories as Indicators of Out-of-Hospital Time Critical Interventions and Associated Emergency Department Outcomes.” Prehospital Emergency Care. 2024; April 29. pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38626286 (accessed Feb. 2, 2026).

4. Clawson, J.J., Scott, G., Gardett, I., Taillac, P., Fivaz, C., Olola, C. “Predictive Ability of an Emergency Medical Dispatch Stroke Diagnostic Tool in Identifying Hospital-Confirmed Strokes.” Journal of Stroke & Cerebrovascular Diseases. 2016; August. strokejournal.org/article/S1052-3057(16)30045-3/abstract (accessed Feb. 2, 2026).

5. Wells, L.M., Crocker, K., Adams, A., Lindgren, L., Gage, C., Powell, J., Panchal, A.R., Patrick, C. “EMD-Assessed Stroke Diagnostic Tool Accuracy.” Annals of Emergency Dispatch. 2025; April 4. aedrjournal.org/studying-the-predictive-ability-of-the-mpds-stroke-diagnostic-tool (accessed Feb. 2, 2026).

6. Media Relations Team. “Health services respond with changes after research reveals chance to improve temperature checks in prehospital births.” UWE Bristol. 2024; Feb. 1. uwe.ac.uk/news/research-into-out-of-hospital-births-leads-to-improved-working-practices (accessed Feb. 2, 2026).