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As the Argus Leader reported, there seemed to be some trouble getting an ambulance when most needed.

Sideras stated in the article that “many SFFR members are paramedics”. This ‘may’ be a change from the last contract held by Rural Metro, the fire department paramedics were PROHIBITED from using any of their skills within the city limits.

Was that ban lifted under this contract? Was any Advanced Life Support (ALS) equipment added to the fire trucks for the paramedics to use?

If not, Sideras’s statement is misleading because the paramedics cannot perform any skills other than their EMT-level training (under the old contract).

If the Ambulance company (Paramedics Plus, Rural Metro under the old contract) is in system overload, only they could approve other ambulances to enter the city (such as volunteer service ambulances from surrounding communities, like Med Star, Sanford or Avera) to transport patients to hospitals.

Did this change in the new contract? Wouldn’t this be better than people driving themselves to the hospital? Why wouldn’t the fire department have this decision-making power instead of the company that profits from transporting the people?

Like Mr. Lonneman said, in a tornado or some other major disaster, should we need a private company’s decision to bring in more ambulances? Maybe language has changed in the new contract, I don’t know, but a good question to ask.

It would be in the patient’s best interest to have the ability to call in an ambulance whenever one was needed, Paramedics Plus losing a transport shouldn’t be the City’s concern. If they lose too many transports, they’ll put another ambulance in service.

On a side note. REMSA, should be determining what calls will and won’t count against the ambulance service for that 90% of the time number they have to meet. For example: If the ambulance has to go through construction traffic because 12th street is torn up, the Q/A person has decided in the past that isn’t the ambulance company’s fault, the construction was caused by the City, so that delay didn’t count against their numbers. Another example: All of their ambulances were out on calls on higher than expected call volume due to a multiple vehicle accident.

The fire department counts these types of calls and doesn’t take them as exceptions for their accreditation and as you probably guessed, Rural Metro always was in compliance with their required 90% times.

It would be interesting to see how many things are now in the new contract that could benefit the SFFR by allowing them to charge PP back for services like fire stand-bys, equipment, code 5 calls, etc.

I have often scratched my head why the SFFD just doesn’t run a public ambulance service that they could set up as an enterprise fund (all the money paid into the service could go in to improving it instead shareholder profits). The Fire Department is already beating the private ambulances to these calls, it is a majority of their calls, and we are already paying for it through our taxes, so why not find a way to save the city money by charging for the service while providing better service then what our private ambulance companies are doing. The city of Los Angeles figured it out, why can’t we?

8 Thoughts on “More questions arise about our ‘New and Improved’ ambulance service

  1. Citizens should be asking how fast the fire department gets there, and by contract how long the ambulance has to get there?

    I think they’d be shocked.

    It should also be public information how many times the fire department has to send a truck because no ambulance is available.

    Citizens should also think about who they want providing their care. A department with their primary concern being patient care or a company with a boss whose primary concern is profit margins?

    Lastly, there’s one person who works for the health department who checks the ambulance response times and decides which calls should or shouldn’t count against them to ensure contract compliance. There’s no written rules on the exceptions as to which calls can be thrown out and no one appears to have access to audit her work. I don’t know how Paramedics Plus is fairing under her watch, but Rural Metro never failed to meet their 90% goal, and their long response time calls frequently managed to meet the unwritten rules for being ‘excluded’.

    Another transparency issue in government.

  2. The D@ily Spin on June 8, 2016 at 5:56 pm said:

    I’ve only read here and the Argus about ambulance service. What’s apparent is it’s inferior. Private service answered my need recently. It was immediate and professional. They probably saved my life. Frankly, I don’t trust the city with my life. Their focus is tennis, concerts, and luxury hotels. They’ll need taxpayers to fund Huether luxuries and should at least try to keep us alive.

  3. anominous on June 8, 2016 at 10:16 pm said:

    If you listen to the police scanner online, you can hear a lot of stuff like this… dispatch explaining there were “no trucks” available to assist a 94 year old woman who was having a stroke in the middle of the morning, etc.

  4. i12doit on June 9, 2016 at 8:39 am said:

    Supposedly, the Paramedics on the SFFR can’t administer meds or utilize some skills because of the liability the City could face. You would think since the city loves it’s citizens so much that they would want the first qualified person on the scene to administer life saving medications for Strokes, Heart Attacks, etc. However, that is not the case. These hands tied behind their back Paramedics are nothing more than a dog and pony show for SFFR to make it look like they have qualified medical personnel, which they do, but they don’t let them do what they are qualified for, (another misleading example of a City with many dirty little secrets). They could save lives and by not being able to administer clot busting meds to stroke patients and the like or Narcan to Opioid Overdoses, shows lack of concern for the well-being of the community. This letting people die policy shows the morbidity of the law makers and SFFR’s Administration’s Candy Asses not pushing for a right to life service shows cowardice by not standing up for the life saving value of the City’s Paramedics who are usually the first qualified Responder’s on the Scene who are trained to administer the same meds as the Advanced Life Support Ambulances. The city has blood on their hands here and its a dirty rotten shame. It reminds me of sending the Military somewhere and then not letting them do their job while watching people die. Time is of the utmost importance in critical life and death situations and hiring Paramedics and not letting them use their skills and full potential to save lives is pathetic. These professional Paramedics on SFFR are used for show. Let these skilled professionals save lives. I can only imagine how many of them feel knowing they could administer something to put the odds in favor of saving someone’s life, especially those of children but instead just standing their watching them die. Utilize the SFFR Professional Paramedics for something other than ornaments on the big Red Fire Trucks. SFFR has great EMS skills and have taught many in the community to save lives and lives have been saved by their teachings. It makes me want to puke that the Administration seemingly don’t trust their men and women in the field. Equally as disgusting as SFPD Administration not trusting their boots on the ground to handle situations without all of the micromanagement. These people are paid trained Professionals, but as usual management has to act like they are needed to oversee these qualified but treated as unqualified staff to justify their high dollar ego that comes with the gold badge. Politicians and Management sometimes need to get out of the way and let these brave men and women do what they do best, and that is SAVE LIVES.

  5. i12doit:

    One of the reasons SFFR’s paramedic’s can’t do anything is because of the way REMSA runs the show behind the scenes. Specifically one person behind the scenes.

    Volunteer firefighters in the county can perform for skills than the full-time, paid firefighter-EMT’s of SFFR thanks to her and the spineless Sideras.

    For years the fire department through the union and through committee pushed for various skills that EMT’s were supposed to have, but Sideras never brought them before the REMSA board for fear of angering the powerful head and then came back to the department and blamed REMSA to his union supporters and others claiming he did his job and brought it up.

    The ER doctors were so sick of Sideras doing nothing as the department liaison to REMSA before he became chief, they wrote a letter to the fire chief at the time asking him to start attending all the REMSA meetings because they didn’t trust Sideras to accomplish anything they were asking.

    The REMSA person causing the problem allegedly had a doctor friend go around and chew out all of the doctors at both hospitals who signed the letter sent to the chief.

    The point is if Sideras was more concerned with politics than patient care before he was chief, do you think he will be leading the charge to improve services for the citizens now?

    Just look at what your EMT’s can do. The volunteer firefighters are still allowed to perform more skills than your paid, full-time professionals, and your paramedics can’t even do as much as those volunteers.

  6. The D@ily Spin on June 10, 2016 at 7:03 am said:

    Isn’t SFFD like being abducted by aliens? Human doctors later discover weird inappropriate methods. You lose track of time for hours but finally find your way home.

  7. i12doit on June 10, 2016 at 11:39 am said:

    Sad Medic: Thanks for your input. It’s amazing what goes on behind the scenes. My point being, people can die because of this dumbass bullshit politics. If you really are a Medic, thanks for your service and for your contributions here.

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