A Santa Clara County civil grand jury on Wednesday called for a wholesale rethinking of fire departments and emergency responses, arguing that sending firefighters to what are now mostly medical calls is outdated and wasteful.
A report by the watchdog panel found that 70 percent of fire department calls are medical emergencies, and just 4 percent are fire-related. But even so, firefighters respond as if they are heading to a fire, sending a crew of three or more on a truck or engine costing an average of $500,000 -- five times the cost of an ambulance.
Typically only one of the three arriving firefighters has medical training, the report said. That creates a "mismatch between service needed and service provided," with fire departments deploying "personnel who are overtrained to meet the need" -- that is, paramedics also trained as firefighters.
"Taxpayers can no longer afford to fund the status quo," the report said. "Using firefighter-paramedics in firefighting equipment as first responders to all non-police emergencies is unnecessarily costly when less expensive paramedics on ambulances possess the skills needed to address the 96 percent of calls that are not fire-related."
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What a Crock; Think maybe that there was a political agenda in the minds of some on that jury?
ReplyDeleteWe really need to push on the Pub Ed to get the message out that less than four or five staff on scene initially is sub standard for an acute/critical medical aid.
Departments in our area send full staffing assignments in spite of Dispatch Triage of calls. They do this because liability is such a big issue, and thay are worried about mistakes leading to under response which may result in poor Pt. outcomes and lawsuits. Are other areas doing this as well? P Perhaps changing this practice could result in some taxpayer savings, maybe in conjunction with tort reform? 20 Year Fire Medic.
What a Crock; Think maybe that there was a political agenda in the minds of some on that jury?
ReplyDeleteWe really need to push on the Pub Ed to get the message out that less than four or five staff on scene initially is sub standard for an acute/critical medical aid.
Departments in our area send full staffing assignments in spite of Dispatch Triage of calls. They do this because liability is such a big issue, and thay are worried about mistakes leading to under response which may result in poor Pt. outcomes and lawsuits. Are other areas doing this as well? P Perhaps changing this practice could result in some taxpayer savings, maybe in conjunction with tort reform? 20 Year Fire Medic.
What a Crock; Think maybe that there was a political agenda in the minds of some on that jury?
ReplyDeleteWe really need to push on the Pub Ed to get the message out that less than four or five staff on scene initially is sub standard for an acute/critical medical aid.
Departments in our area send full staffing assignments in spite of Dispatch Triage of calls. They do this because liability is such a big issue, and thay are worried about mistakes leading to under response which may result in poor Pt. outcomes and lawsuits. Are other areas doing this as well? P Perhaps changing this practice could result in some taxpayer savings, maybe in conjunction with tort reform? 20 Year Fire Medic.