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Morning all,
An unusual one – during our flight back from Tokyo Haneda on 07/MAY/2024 to London Heathrow (Business class) a passenger had a heart attack over Greenland. My wife was the only doctor on board and volunteered/was asked to help which she did for about 6 hours while the flight was diverted to Iceland. Heroic stuff and I am so proud and the passenger thankfully was OK and the staff and crew did amazing, we even made it to London with only a few hours delay once we offloaded passenger and refueled. There was understandably no cabin service for the last half of the flight though and my wife (20 weeks pregnant) was completely exhausted and low on blood sugar! One of the Captains took her details and we were booked in on our BAEC cards. They handed us champagne as a thank you (which we had to give up for our connecting flight, it was 1am and I couldn’t stomach that and she’s obviously not drinking) and promised to be in touch.
When we arrived we were given new flights the following day and standard hotels etc. We hit the border shut down however and queued till my wife fainted. Again the staff were amazing and helped – this time giving us medical help! I think that was all okay for getting us new flights and an inconceivable reason to be delayed!
The rub however is – selfishly we paid a lot for the flights, it was pretty traumatic, it wasn’t quite the relaxing flight we had hope for our 1st anniversary and although my wife willingly helped and it is why she went into medicine, how long do we give BA before they say an official thank you? She’d also love to see how the patient is doing as they got to know each other once she was conscious!
I’ll say once again that the BA crew and ground staff were amazing (I’d even want to say thank you to them for their help but also my wife has some medical feedback on access to equipment and drugs in an emergency) but I’ve not got a huge amount of confidence in the wheels of BA back office staff to get round to sorting some redress. I’m much less selfless than she is and I’ve always wanted to go First Class 😛
Is it too early/too cheeky to ask?
‘In it for the money’ – Nick
Wow. That’s fabulous that your wife stepped up and provided what obviously was a live saving effort – particularly in light of being 20 weeks pregnant. Well done to her.
As for recompense I would hope that the bottle of champagne and thanks at the time would be sufficient. I doubt you will get much more from BA.
I would however encourage your wife to write to BA via the Ba.com/contactus page if she has feedback on improving the medical equipment or procedures on board. And I would mention the desire to find out how the patient is doing though data privacy laws may prevent BA from giving an update and they may not know themselves anyway. I would include a very brief summary of the assistance provided. Include details of the flight number including her seat number. That may prompt BA to award a gesture of some Avios for her assistance at tge time.
Am I reading this correctly, you’d like BA to provide future FC flights due to your wife assisting in a medical emergency?
You want an “official thank you”? You were thanked on the plane. And seemingly you personally did nothing. So forget the first class flights. What a joke.
Oh dear, was it clear the patient was going private?
We mostly want to check the patient has received the itemized invoice.
As for the rage – the first class was clearly flippancy. My wife will never ask for anything and never expects anything – as no healthcare professional does. However she helped someone to the point of her own exhaustion while she was meant to be relaxing and not working. Which is far beyond the minor inconveniences some people suffer and demand compensation for. I’ll go to bat for her always to see she gets acknowledged.
I think that a gesture of gratitude from BA would be entirely appropriate, but suspect there is a high chance you’ll get fobbed off with 10k Avios.
Actually scrap all that – I remember someone clapping on a Thursday, we’re all sorted.
We mostly want to check the patient has received the itemized invoice.
As for the rage – the first class was clearly flippancy. My wife will never ask for anything and never expects anything – as no healthcare professional does. However she helped someone to the point of her own exhaustion while she was meant to be relaxing and not working. Which is far beyond the minor inconveniences some people suffer and demand compensation for. I’ll go to bat for her always to see she gets acknowledged.
I see your point of view – your wife had a ruined trip and saved a life. All while 20 weeks pregnant! She does deserve recognition from BA (and the patient who’s life she saved). Be it just a phone call from CS. Or a more substantial “reward”.
I wouldnt expect to do my job for 6 hours instead of getting some rest on a flight without any compensation.I’m surprised no details were exchanged either way between you and the patient.
Hi Nick,
Big thanks to your wife. I was on a Ryanair flight last week when the same call went out, and – fortunately – there was someone on board who stepped up. First time I have been on a flight where this has happened.
If I ran BA, I would be sending you a complementary flight or upgrade – as above, I don’t think it happens often enough to break the bank! And no-one would/could fake it.
Great to see the cabin crew tried to show their best – even though Champagne probably wasn’t the ideal gift for someone 20 weeks pregnant (although it might come in useful in a few months time to wet the baby’s head!)
And for certain, if I was the patient, I would want to send some suitable thank you. But some people may think different, so BA might be happy to pass your details on to them, but not vice versa.
I agree it can be traumatic for all – a doctor on holiday mode, and fellow passengers sitting nearby. (I was at the back of the bus on Ryanair, so I have no idea what happened down the front. But if I had been sitting next to them, I would have been tense and nervous, with fingers crossed!)
My colleague (a pilot, but not a medic) was driving past a golf course when a man flagged him down. His pal had had a heart attack and he needed help. My pal got him to phone 999 and performed CPR – don’t worry about remembering how many breaths and compressions, the folk on the phone will tell you each one – and it was at least 10 minutes before the ambulance arrived, and then the helicopter and the police. He was absolutely knackered by the time the paramedics took over. And then they all left, leaving him alone on a golf course alone thinking: what the heck just happened!
He was more than pleased when the man’s family got in touch to thank him – a quick phone call made him happy, although sadly the chap didn’t survive.
Many doctors can have a whole career without knowing whether they have saved someone’s life. A big thanks from me for her work, she should hold her head up high. When the time came, she did her personal, professional and public duty – that’s why medicine is more than a job or a career, it’s a vocation.
Doubt BA has the generosity for anything monetary. Perhaps, as a compromise, ask for something non-monetary? A few passes to CCR when you travel economy? Or use of the first class checkin?
This is indeed a very interesting dilemma.
However, it was not BA that caused the heart attack. Anything they’d offer you would be out of generosity. It seems that the only angle is “lack of service” for which you can ask for couple thousand Avios.
I don’t think BA has any moral liability here. It is the patient who should chase after your wife and thank her — if even.If that happened on a TfL bus, would you ask for anything from Sadiq?
Speaking of heart attacks :((
If that happened on a TfL bus, would you ask for anything from Sadiq?
Apart from the fact that BA/IAG are a corporate/for profit organisation who are saving costs by putting out a call for a Dr to work for free when a medical emergency happens. If someone has a heart attack on a London bus, you dial 999 and a paramedic arrives promptly!
You are morally right. However, afaik they have no legal requirement for this.
That’s why I said the possible compensation would be just out of their generosity rather than a legal requirement.
Plus
Let me make my example a bit more complicated.
At a bus heart attack, you dial 999 but you are in a remote village and the ambulance is late.
The passenger Dr gets involved.
Would you ask for a compensation from the village council?
I think the answer is a sound no.You are morally right. However, afaik they have no legal requirement for this.
That’s why I said the possible compensation would be just out of their generosity rather than a legal requirement.
Plus
Let me make my example a bit more complicated.
At a bus heart attack, you dial 999 but you are in a remote village and the ambulance is late.
The passenger Dr gets involved.
Would you ask for a compensation from the village council?
I think the answer is a sound no.But surely a bus heart attack wouldnt involve 300 people potentially being stranded 2,000 miles from their homes. And the Doctor on board getting involved meaning the bus/plane didnt have to divert with the huge costs that would involve.
Sure. But when someone is dying I tend not to think about the fuel cost.
That is why being a Dr is a bit different.
The rub however is – selfishly we paid a lot for the flights, it was pretty traumatic, it wasn’t quite the relaxing flight we had hope for our 1st anniversary
Not sure the heart attack patient had a very relaxing flight either 😉
If the heart attack patient was asking this question about not having had a relaxing flight and wanting to obtain some kind of compensation or refund, I think the advice would be ‘not BA’s fault’….
Maybe instead of counting how many Avios or how much compensation you will receive, just count your blessings that all were okay, and that someone was on hand to help your wife in the same way.
Something like that is a great story to tell, especially if she has any promotion interviews and I am sure this will look excellent on her CV.
Not every reward is instant.
This sounds a lot like people who oppose junior doctors striking on the basis that they apparently signed up to be exploited and they should be grateful they get to save people’s lives…
For the village example, I’m pretty sure the village council would make a point of thanking the doctor.
Firstly, the OP was told by the crew that they would be in touch. If there is no further contact then this reflects very poorly on both the crew and BA.
Recognising (or not recognising) this sort of thing says a lot about an organisation in terms of its culture. If I were the CEO of British Airways and was told that a 20 week pregnant woman worked tirelessly for six hours on one of my flights to save the life of one of my customers (to the point that she passed out later on) I would make a point of calling the doctor to personally thank her. I’d probably be handing out Gold status for a year or something similar as a thank you.
Now who knows, British Airways might still offer some recognition but I would leave it a month or two and if there is nothing I’d send an email to our friend the CEO giving details of what happened and saying how upset your wife was that there has been no further contact given that she was keen to find out if the passenger is okay and also had medical feedback for BA. If BA expect doctors to step up (which they clearly do) then they should make a point of formally thanking them and providing a mechanism for the doctors to provide feedback.
Very well said @Froggee – could not agree more.
I look on this from the flip side. Did your wife start helping the patient because she expected to gain some financial/status/avios compensation for doing so?
I can only imagine she did it because she wanted to help and do the right thing. Bravo to her for doing so.
Would it be good if BA did something like phone her to say thank you? Yes. A further token of appreciation? Yes. But surely the fact she has helped save a life is why she started to help in the first place, so is she actually upset she hasn’t had anything else? (Is it in fact just you that *wants* something more tangible than the thanks already given and she would just be satisfied knowing how the person she helped fared?)
As for finding out how the other person got on, GDPR makes that hard. From that point of view your would have to contact BA in a written form to say you are happy for your info to be passed to the other person. They would also have to contact BA to say they are happy for their info to be passed to you. That’s the only way I can see the two of you being able to contact each other. Not impossible, but more tricky than it used to be.
PS I work in a role where I gain pleasure/work satisfaction from helping others. I rarely get a well done from anyone more senior than my immediate circle of colleagues, and never anything financial, but that did not matter as it is not why I try hard to do my best for everyone I deal with.
The patient was incredibly lucky – presumably if there had been no medical professional on board the crew would have had to make do with relayed instructions from someone on the ground? 6 hours sounds like an eternity in the air with that going on, but I’m guessing there was nowhere nearer to make an unscheduled landing?
Certainly the crew should have passed this on to someone very high up and you’d hope someone would at least dispatch flowers and chocolates. Though I did read once that Victoria Beckham demanded F travel in perpetuity from BA (?) when they lost her LV luggage (don’t know if she got it!)
I am wondering if the patient was aware that he was being cared for by a fellow passenger, what sort of state was he in?
There was a year when 5 out of 6 flights we took had a medical emergency and Mrs always sprung into action.
As @Peter K said, the immediate thought was to offer help and it was the right thing to do – though nothing as serious as a heart attack in the middle of Greenland.
Yes my newborn was somewhat inconvenienced with her breast milk supply chain disruption nor was she impressed with me.
I thought some comments were a bit too harsh as the OP’s wife would also be entitled not to avail her skills and sit back nurturing her unborn child.
But that could literally be gambling with someone’s life and your own conscience.
IAG realy really really really don’t care. It’s inherent in their business mindset.
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