Help Is on the Way

How Lower Austria's Emergency Call Center Saves Lives in Seconds

By Anna Mayr

The third floor of the Lower Austria Emergency Call Center in St. Pölten is quiet. The steady tapping of keyboards and the murmur of voices fill the room. Around 20 people sit at the control station, their eyes fixed on the monitors in front of them—maps, numbers, flashing fields. Yet nothing feels frantic.

The phone rings. A young man reaches for his headset and speaks: "Lower Austria Emergency Services, where exactly is the emergency?" On his screen, a form opens—a scientifically validated international protocol that dictates every question and, based on the answers, automatically branches into different paths.

"The protocol must be followed to the letter, always the same structure," explains Matthias Maiwald of Notruf NOE (Lower Austria Emergency Call).

"What happened?" asks the EMD (Emergency Medical Dispatcher), the critical link between the person in distress and the rescue system. The woman on the line is barely audible. A severe bleeding wound, likely a ruptured vein.

On one of the screens, a status changes from "ready" to "en route.""Help is on the way," the dispatcher says, then instructs the woman to elevate her injured leg and avoid eating or drinking until help arrives.

2 Million Calls a Year

Even as the call continues, the ambulance is already dispatched and moving. A quick click confirms the deployment. The vehicle's location appears on the map—a green dot beginning to move. The dispatcher monitors its progress to ensure it reaches the scene.

In the background, another call comes in—one of two million a year. A faint signal tone, nearly lost amid the voices in the room. A colleague picks up. The same first question. In roughly 300,000 cases, emergency responders are alerted. The numbers tell the story: Not every call ends in a deployment. Some last only seconds—a wrong number, a misunderstanding.

Others take time: callers unsure if it's an emergency, people in pain but hesitant, those who just need someone to tell them what to do next. These calls, too, land here and are often rerouted to the 1450 health advice hotline, where qualified nurses assess symptoms, provide recommendations, and, if needed, refer callers to doctors or on-call services. What could have been an emergency dispatch becomes targeted advice instead. "In Lower Austria, we're leading the way," Maiwald adds. Technologically, too, he sees the region at the forefront.

The Notruf NOE App

When an emergency call comes in via the Notruf NOE app, the location appears instantly on the system's map—marked "emergency site"—before the first question is even asked. The app has been in use since 2017, but it remains underutilized. Most people still reach for the phone in an emergency. Yet the app could do more than just transmit location: in some cases, users can also share pre-existing conditions or allergies—if they choose to. In practice, though, this potential is rarely tapped. The biggest challenge often remains the first minute of a call: pinpointing the location, grasping the situation, making decisions—all while help is already on its way.