COLLEGE PARK, Ga. — Friends, coaches, and teammates gathered to remember a teenager who died after collapsing during volleyball practice.
Amanda Sylvester, 15, died at the hospital Dec. 5.
“Amanda was a sweet girl,” said Catherine Murray. “Straight A student.”
Murray is founder of Sylvester’s volleyball team, Dream Chasers Volleyball Club.
Sylvester was warming up for practice around 6 p.m. in the evening when she collapsed on the court. Surveillance video from inside the gym shows someone run to get help and call 911.
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Sylvester’s mother shows up minutes later, comforts her, fans her.
Nine minutes after the collapse, two medical technicians showed up from College Park Fire Rescue. They stabilized the teenager. A spokesperson for the city said they could not legally take her to the hospital because they are not licensed to transport as medical technicians. Paramedics must do that.
So, they waited for Grady Hospital to send an ambulance.
After about 30 minutes, Sylvester’s mother decides to take her daughter to the hospital herself. The med-techs roll her to the mother’s SUV on an office rolling chair.
Sylvester died at the hospital.
“Something has got to give,” said Murray. “When I say something got to give, it is like, something happened, and we got to fix whatever that is that allowed that to happen. We just got to fix that.”
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At the vigil honoring Sylvester she said she is feeling anger, but her players need her now.
“We are going to attend her funeral, and we are going to continue to move forward. I am going to teach these kids to move forward,” said Murray.
Under Georgia law restricts med-techs from transporting patients to the hospital. They do not have the same training as paramedics. Medical technicians are permitted to transport patients in life-threating situations if a licensed physician orders it or if a licensed ambulance cannot respond.
In response, a College Park spokesperson said this case was not marked as “critical” at the time, a doctor had not ordered transport and the med-techs considered the ambulance “pending” status as a response.
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