The Round Table

The Round Table

Does your department provide any type of emergency medical service for the people you serve? If so, just what type of service is it? And how is this service funded (taxes, fund raising, etc.?)

Leonard L. LaPour, Jr., Chief, Marshalltown, Iowa:The City of Marshalltown provides emergency medical service as an adjunct to the Marshall County ambulance service that is operated by the Marshalltown Area Community Hospital. Our role, a very minor one, is to provide standby service when all their units are busy. This occurs probably no more than five or six times a year. The hospital ambulance and emergency medical service do an outstanding job and are funded primarily from revenues derived and the balance from tax money levied by the county.

Our limited service is funded by tax money taken from the fire department operations budget. All our personnel are required to be EMT’s with current certification.

I believe this to be an ideal situation as the hospital utilizes their personnel for hospital duties as well as ambulance duties, and is far more feasible economically than having professional fire fighters in the dual role.

Wayman Schmitt, Chief, Jacksonville, Ark.: At the present time 38 of our 39 firemen have completed the emergency medical technician course at the Fire Training Academy in Camden, Ark. Twenty-four of these fire men have been certified as qualified EMT’s by the Arkansas State Health Department.

The police department now provides the ambulance service in our city. However, we assist them when needed and have done so on many occassions.

The services we provide are funded through taxes.

F.G. Leeke, Chief, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada: Until 1974, the ambulance service was part of the Oak Bay Fire Department operation and was paid for through municipal taxes. Residents requiring the service were given assistance at no fee per service. The department operated a van which was equipped as an ambulance and manned it with two fire fighters per shift; all employees worked on the ambulance and received industrial first aid training. Because of the central location of the fire hall and the compact size of the municipality, response time from the fire hall to any location in the district averaged 2 1/2 minutes, and with a large acute care hospital located near the municipal boundaries, a patient could be quickly transported to the emergency ward for specialized treatment.

When the British Columbia government entered the ambulance field in July 1974, the Emergency Health Services Commission took over the administration of the service and this department now operates as an agency of the Commission. We charge them for all legitimate expenses we incur on their behalf (such as heat, light, space for housing the vehicle, gasoline, administrative costs, etc.) The Commission owns and provides the ambulance, which they license and insure, all equipment and medical supplies. All fire fighters in our department have been registered as ambulance attendants with the Commission and we continue to assign two men to the vehicle each shift. Our employees continue to receive industrial first aid training which is now paid for by the Commission. For each ambulance call completed, the Commission currently pays the municipality $111.16 to cover the cost of the men we supply. This amount is the same whether we are out of the fire hall for four minutes or four hours. At the end of each month, the fire department administration submits expense statements and the government reimburses the municipality. The fire fighters do not receive additional remuneration for being ambulance attendants. We operate mainly as an emergency service, however, occassionally we respond to ordinary transportation cases if the other vehicles are unavailable.

R.T. Mantlo, Chief, Grand Junction, Col.: The Grand Junction Fire Department at the present time has six paramedics who respond to rescue squad calls. One paramedic and one EMT accompany the squad each time it is called. We are a paid fire department. The squad calls are charged as follows: City, $15; Rural, $20; Outside the district, $20 plus 50 cents a mile from the scene to the hospital.

Wilbur Bills, Chief, Delaware, Oh.: We provide 1-squad manned by certified EMT-A’s and 1-medic unit manned by ceritfied paramedics (as required by state law). Both are for the purpose of answering emergency calls only. We are funded by the city budget and partially by a county piggy back sales tax which also supports a county EMS system, which answers all emergency runs in the county and invalid calls in both the city and county. We only answer emergency calls in the city, but we do back up the county when they are tied up and they do the same for us. The county is manned by EMT-A’s only, no paramedics.

We answer approximately 1400 emergency runs per year. We have 28 certified EMT -A’s and 12 certified paramedics.

Michael G. McGowan, Chief, Fairbanks, Ak.: Our fire department only provides emergency fire services—prevention, prefire planning and fire suppression. We carry emergency medical equipment on our fire apparatus only to treat any injuries until an ambulance arrives on the scene. Ambulance service is provided by the North Pole Fire Department, Ft. Wainwright Army Hospital, and Fairbanks Fire Department.

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