House Amendment 1
H 4867 - Session 125 (2023-2024)
Telecommunicator CPR Training Law

The Committee on Education and Public Works proposes the following amendment (LC-4867.CM0002H):

Amend the bill, as and if amended, SECTION 1, by striking Section 23-23-45(A) and inserting:

 (A) Beginning January 1, 2025, all 911 telecommunicators that provide dispatch for emergency medical conditions shall be required to be trained, utilizing the most current nationally recognized cardiovascular care guidelines, in high quality T-CPR. The instruction shall incorporate recognition protocols for out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA), compression-only CPR instruction for callers, and continuous education which must be completed on an annual basis.

Amend the bill further, SECTION 1, by striking Section 23-23-45(D) and inserting:

 (D) Neither telecommunicators that provide dispatch for emergency medical conditions who have completed the training specified in subsection (A) nor the State or the agency, political subdivision, or governmental entity employing such telecommunicators shall be liable for any civil damages for any personal injury arising from the provision of CPR instructions to 911 callers except acts or omissions amounting to gross negligence or willful or wanton misconduct. Any civil cause of action for damages arising from the provision of T-CPR instructions and brought against the State, an agency, a political subdivision, or a governmental entity and its employee acting within the scope of his official duty must be brought pursuant to the South Carolina Tort Claims Act, Chapter 78, Title 15.

Amend the bill further, by adding an appropriately numbered SECTION to read:

SECTION X. Section 23-23-10(E) of the S.C. Code is amended to read:

 (E) As contained in this chapter:
  (1) "Law enforcement officer" means an appointed officer or employee hired by and regularly on the payroll of the State or any of its political subdivisions, who is granted statutory authority to enforce all or some of the criminal, traffic, and penal laws of the State and who possesses, with respect to those laws, the power to effect arrests for offenses committed or alleged to have been committed.
  (2) "Council" means the South Carolina Law Enforcement Training Council created by this chapter.
  (3) "Academy" means the South Carolina Criminal Justice Academy created by this chapter.
  (4) "Director" means the Director of the South Carolina Criminal Justice Academy.
  (5) "T-CPR" means telecommunicator cardiopulmonary resuscitation, which is the dispatcher-assisted delivery of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) instruction by trained emergency call takers or public safety dispatchers to callers or bystanders for events requiring CPR, such as out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA)".