Redundant Fire and EMS response in Florida

[Schwaa]

Florida dosnt have ILS, so no ILS engines. Sunstar is the trasport company for pinellas county. Susntar is being run by paramedics plus, before that it was AMR. The lowest bidder wins. Every engine in the county is ALS and over 75% of the calls are medical.

2007 stats:

Emergency EMS calls - 165,457

NON- Emergency EMS - 101,773

Fire Calls - 18,727

Those Non-emergency EMS calls are calls determined to be non emergent after being received by the 911 center, they dont get an engine lights and sirens. Most likely they will get a sunstar ambulance(ALS) non emergency. NOT EVERY CALL GETS 3 MILLION UNITS RESPONDING LIGHTS AND SIRENS

Want to talk about redundant. The system in which the author talks about, Hillsborough County Fire Rescue, is no better off. Hilsborough county has mostly all ALS, besides some trucks just like Pinellas. They also have Rescues that are capable of transporting patients.

Say Hillsborough gets called out for a DIB. Automatic ALS engine and ALS rescue. Rescue and engine get on scene and determines its a BS call. So thats 2 units that are allready on scene. What does the transport capable rerscue unit do? Requests a contracted BLS ambulance on top of the Egine and Rescue allready on scene. BLS ambulance 15 minutes out? recue says ok, I dont feel like waiting, Send then lights and sirens. What to talk about a F--- up system?

If any of you want any specifics on either systems, so that you arnt forming your opinion on this biased article, feel free to pm me and i will see what i can do.

[akroeze]

DIB

What does this stand for? Diabetic Intravascular Botulism?

[VentMedic]

What does this stand for? Diabetic Intravascular Botulism?

Dead In Bed?

It may mean Difficulty in Breathing which got its start a few years ago when "SOB" was considered offensive because it got "giggles" in the EMT/Paramedic classes.

And they wonder why the ED staff doesn't bother to read their reports. Each agency has their own set of terms and abbreviations. Of course, since most skipped any standard medical prerequisite classes that covered basic medical terminology/abbreviations, what can you expect?

[frontcrawl]

Want to talk about redundant. The system in which the author talks about, Hillsborough County Fire Rescue, is no better off. Hilsborough county has mostly all ALS, besides some trucks just like Pinellas. They also have Rescues that are capable of transporting patients.

First, a request to everyone. If you're talking about an ambulance could you please say so? Because a "rescue" could be an ambulance, some sort of pickup truck or a 70,000 pound mutant fire truck with sixteen reciprocating saws onboard. It this case it might be one of those stupid "squmper" things. It's just another localism.

Now, please note the sections of the paragraph below I've highlighted through the use of bold text.

Say Hillsborough gets called out for a DIB. Automatic ALS engine and ALS rescue. Rescue and engine get on scene and determines its a BS call. So thats 2 units that are allready on scene. What does the transport capable rerscue unit do? Requests a contracted BLS ambulance on top of the Egine and Rescue allready on scene. BLS ambulance 15 minutes out? recue says ok, I dont feel like waiting, Send then lights and sirens. What to talk about a F--- up system?

Oh, oh, I know, I know, let me answer!

Fire them all on the spot, then sell the ambulance to someone who might actually use it properly.

[VentMedic]

Even better is when you have an ALS engine and an ALS Rescue with transport capability responding to a patient with a true emergency. For a few cities in Florida, that ALS Rescue ambulance is just for show even though it is perfectly capable of hauling a patient. The ALS crews will still wait the 15 minutes (or have them run L/S) for the contracted BLS ambulance, load up the patient, all their ALS gear and 1 or 2 paramedics into that BLS ambulance. They will then proceed to the hospital with the ALS engine and ALS Rescue ambulance parading behind to pick up their paramedics at the hospital.

[brentoli]

I am so flipping confused...

What does the term rescue mean in this thread?

Is it...

Or...

Or...

[Schwaa]

I should probably wind up putting some thought into my posts before i ramble on...

That would be the type of rescue I am referring to. Sorry for the spelling errors, I was typing a little quick this morning.

Even better is when you have an ALS engine and an ALS Rescue with transport capability responding to a patient with a true emergency. For a few cities in Florida, that ALS Rescue ambulance is just for show even though it is perfectly capable of hauling a patient. The ALS crews will still wait the 15 minutes (or have them run L/S) for the contracted BLS ambulance, load up the patient, all their ALS gear and 1 or 2 paramedics into that BLS ambulance. They will then proceed to the hospital with the ALS engine and ALS Rescue ambulance parading behind to pick up their paramedics at the hospital.

As you may allready know, that is almost the same system in place in Pinellas, except the contracted ambulance is ALS(sunstar).

[frontcrawl]

So, in Pinellas the municipal fire department responds first with an ALS non-transport ambulance and sometimes a fire truck alongside the Sunstar PUM people? But in Hillsborough the fire department responds and either transports or turfs calls to private BLS?

:roll:

I used to live down there but it was like ten years ago and I wasn't paying a hell of a lot of attention to this sort of thing.

[CBEMT]

The system works for them.

It'd be nice if the system worked for the patients and citizens, but apparently that's too much to ask for.

[mrsmall]

I am so flipping confused...

What does the term rescue mean in this thread?

In FL when they refer to a "rescue" they are referring to

...

Anyway, just thought I'd throw in that Marion county will be 100% fire based EMS starting Oct. 1. To throw insult to injury, if you want to continue serving EMS in this county you have to apply for the fire dept. and start over. go through probation, start FL retirement from Day 1 (with no option to buy in). and lose all seniority... nice huh? not to mention that you are required to become a firefighter within 3 years.