At a rough guess NHSD telephone staff are using the same guided triage system online users have to wade through. If that's the case then I can see why so many spurious 999 calls result. A few months back I was fixing a light switch and shut off the wrong circuit breaker. As a result I got a bit of a belt off the mains resulting in being somewhat shaken up and a tiny blister on one finger. Thinking better safe than sorry I went online and ended up in the 'Burns' section (there's nothing specific on electrical shock). Was there damage to the skin? (yes - a small blister), was the heart racing? (yes, like I said I was pretty shaken) - "CALL 999 IMMEDIATELY!". Now I have more sense than that so went and made myself a cuppa, stuck a plaster on the burn and had a sit-down for half an hour after which all was back to normal and I could get on and fix that &!$** switch. If I'd phoned instead of going online I'm sure I'd have had an ambo outside my door and spent the next 4 hours kicking my heels in A&E (with no tea). Obviously whoever put the triage system together had one thing in mind (shock due to a significant burn) but the way the questions led me through the system I had no way to qualify my answers or apply common sense. I'd hate to be in the shoes of an operator who saw that "CALL 999 IMMEDIATELY" on the screen and had to make a judgement call based on what they were being told rather than what they could see. Personally I too would probably err on the side of caution. Fix the cause, not the symptom.