When life-saving patient transport conflicts with undistracted TV watching, what's more important? It sounds like an easy call, but not for some people in Grosse Pointe Woods.
Residents near St. John Hospital object to noise from emergency medical helicopters landing temporarily in a parking lot, Candice Williams reports in The Detroit News.
She speaks with Robert Robson, who gripes about trouble hearing his favorite TV programs when choppers bring patients needing critical care.
"I think 'Where's the remote so I can pump up the volume,' " said Robson. "It's irritating, but I also have concerns from a safety point of view."
The suburb's council voted to let airlift flights use the hospital lot until mid-May while St. John seeks approval for a permanent helipad atop its west parking garage, which sits in Detroit.
"Because of the life-saving treatments, it's important we can get patients to us immediately," Carrie Stover, a vice president of St. John Providence Health System, tells The News. Before being able to land next to the hospital, stroke patients and others flown in from rural areas came by ambulance from Detroit's City Airport, six miles away.
