ALS/BLS Defined

[chbare]

Thanks for the information. It sounds like it is a little tricky when trying to understand the scope of practice for each level of care. I feel lucky that I can do as many procedures as I can working here in Canada as a Primary Care Paramedic. I would love to do a ride along one day somewhere down in the US just to see how things are done and to give me a better understanding of the level of care that can be done by each level.

Have a good day

You would have to ride in every state, then ride in every county of every state, and I also suspect you may need to consider riding in every municipality of every county of every state to even begin to wrap your head around the scope of practice for the various "levels" of provider in the United States.

Take care,

chbare.

[Lone Star]

You would have to ride in every state, then ride in every county of every state, and I also suspect you may need to consider riding in every municipality of every county of every state to even begin to wrap your head around the scope of practice for the various "levels" of provider in the United States.

Take care,

chbare.

And people wonder why there is such an outcry for a standardized national scope of practice.......

[brentoli]

And people wonder why there is such an outcry for a standardized national scope of practice.......

The scope that is still getting bastardized by the states...

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[kellyj994]

It depends on whether you are profit or non-profit. If money is no object just send ALS on everything, and do not run BLS units (rationale being, why have a limited resource, versus an ambulance that can respond to every call imaginable).

If you are profit driven (which I doubt, since no one in your organization understands billing, that tells me that it isnt important), then you need to use the proper resource, as payment is determined by Medicare Policies (almost all private insurance and Medicaid base their payment schedule on Medicare's). Therefore you can send 3 medics on ever call, but if it is a BLS call, you will only get reimbursed at the BLS rate; conversely if you send a BLS crew on an ALS "rated" call, you will not get the higher reimbursement rate. The following document explains it fairly clearly, skip down to page 25 for explanations of categories (BLS/ALS1/ALS2/SCT).

https://www.cms.gov/...ds/bp102c10.pdf

Great post! It's very nice. Thank you so much for your post.

[Aussieaid]

Educate me....what does INT stand for?

[Lone Star]

Educate me....what does INT stand for?

INT- Intranasal Tube. I'm guessing that it's different than a NG tube?

LS

[Aussieaid]

By intranasal tube do you mean like a nasopharyngeal airway or NPA? (That would be completely different to and NGT or nasogastric tube which goes all the way into the stomach.)

Does INT have another interpretation because if it means an NPA it doesn't seem to fit in another thread where it was used? (I took it to mean something like a saline lock.)