“Make the Call, Don't Miss a Beat” Campaign: Effect on Emergency Medical Services Use in Women with Heart Attack Signs

Background: Our objective was to evaluate the relationship between the “Make The Call, Don't Miss a Beat” national mass media campaign and emergency medical services (EMS) use among women with possible heart attack symptoms. Methods: We linked campaign TV public service advertisement data with national EMS activation data for 2010 to 2014. We identified EMS activations (i.e., responses) for possible heart attack symptoms and for unintentional injuries for both women and men. We estimated the impact of the campaign on the fraction of the 1.7 to 15.9 million activations of women with possible heart attack symptoms compared with 1.9 million female activations for unintentional injuries within each EMS agency and month using quasi-binomial logistic regression controlling for time and state. Results: Of the 3,175 U S. counties, 90% were exposed to the campaign. However, less than 2% of U.S. counties reached moderate TV exposure (≥300 gross rating points) during the entire campaign period. We did not observe an increase in the fraction of female activations for possible heart attack during periods or in counties with higher campaign exposure. Conclusions: This mass media campaign that relied heavily on TV public service advertisements was not associated with increased EMS use by women with possible heart attack symptoms, even among counties that were more highly exposed to the campaign advertisements.