On Sunday, August 15, around 6 a.m., 91-year-old Luella Chamberlin from Arizona was awake and in her kitchen. As she started to prepare herself breakfast, she lost her footing and fell. It was a dire situation: she was alone, bleeding, and unable to get up. A feeling of panic began to overtake her, so she pressed the remote on her Monitronics monitored alarm system and hoped someone would help.
In our Dallas Monitoring Center, first-shift operator April Drayton had just started work when she intercepted Mrs. Chamberlin’s panic alarm. April accessed the two-way voice feature on the system and spoke with Mrs. Chamberlin, realizing immediately that an ambulance was needed. With the help of a colleague, April dispatched one within a minute.
April stayed on the line with Mrs. Chamberlin, calming and assuring her that help would soon be there. Within 10 minutes, the paramedics arrived and made a forced entry into the home. Once inside, they determined that Mrs. Chamberlin needed to be transported to a nearby hospital.
We checked in on Mrs. Chamberlin the next day–she had lost a lot of blood, but was safe and healing. “I got seven stitches in my head and I’m very weak,” she said. “[April] was so nice and polite. You don’t find them like that anymore. Thank you so much.”
Thank you, April, for your excellent work. You made a difference in a customer’s life.

