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ORANGE COUNTY FIRE RESCUE STUDY ORANGE COUNTY EMS ~ 2 The EMS delivery organization is over-burdened and human resources over- 3 worked. Paramedics and EMTs currently work a 24 hour shift. It is not unusual for 4 a paramedic to work more than 80 hours in a work week and more than 320 hours 5 in a 28 day cycle. The staff is exhausted. This shift configuration is a dangerous 6 one for medical personnel as they require their best mental acuity under the County's 7 program. This is well above the FLSA maximum prior to overtime of 56 hours per week 8 and 216 hours during a 28 day cycle. 9 10 Because of the current staffing levels, management has less time to manage and 11 thus many of the quality assurance activities are left undone. ~ 12 13 The Division does not make full use of technology and still operates on a paper- 14 based approach to documentation. 15 16 There is no unit north of Hilisborough at the North Orange Rescue Squad station. 17 This dramatically affects response times and patient care. It aLso places a burden on 18 fire department first responders as they are required to provide care over a longer 19 period of time. 20 21 While it is expected that the Medical Director would be involved in training, 22 Orange County's Medical Director is overly involved in the base details of training 23 as there is no full time training coordinator/instructor. 24 25 The Division does not have a sufficient number of ambulance units. 26 27 28 Recommendations 29 30 Should the County adopt our recommendation to merge the North Orange County 31 Rescue Squad into the EMS Divisio~ it should consider renovating the Rescue 32 Squad's faaliiy for use as EMS headquarters, providing room for training, 33 deployment, offices for EMS and volunteer rescue squad members as well. 34 35 We recommend the Division change the work shift schedule from a four shift to a 36 three shift rotation and change the 24 hour shift to a split shift arrangement of no 37 more than 14 hours. 90 u