Agenda - 10-03-2013 - 1 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Comprehensive Assessment of Emergency Medical Services 87 and 911 /Communications Center Operations Study The responsibility for determining what the EMS system response time objective(s) should be is clearly the County's, in that it is the County that must define the level of care that it intends to provide. 10A NCAC 13P.0201 EMS SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS .0201(a) County governments shall establish EMS Systems. Each EMS System shall have: • A defined geographical service area for the EMS System. • The minimum service area for an EMS System shall be one county. • There may be multiple EMS Provider service areas within the service area of an EMS System. • The highest level of care offered within any EMS Provider service area must be available to the citizens within that service area 24 hours per day. Issue: EMS Base Facilities When conducting space needs assessments to determine the requirements for an EMS building that is to house and secure an ambulance or ambulances and provide for the needs of the personnel assigned to them, one must begin by considering and discussing at least: the size of the vehicles to be housed, the type of support spaces required, the policy and legal requirements that will dictate specific utilitarian, safety, health, hazard prevention and decontamination procedures, the adjacency of and circulation between the individual spaces to be provided, and the overall security requirements of the facility. After which, the architectural details will follow. The Existing Conditions sub - section did not alluded to physical EMS "bases" or "stations ". Rather it referred to EMS "staging "locations. This is because there are no EMS bases or stations; at least none that are in buildings that were ever planned, built or intended for the purpose of accommodating EMS ambulances or EMS personnel. Of significant concern, particularly in view of their cost, is that none of the staging locations available now can offer or assure EMS that it can house an assigned and equipped ambulance inside a code compliant, temperature controlled, securable building as suggested by NCOEMS guidelines. Staff may have seating and work areas available to them but not always adequate restroom, meal preparation, respite, or specifically required OSHA and /or OEMS decontamination facilities. The ambulance staging areas currently assigned have essentially come to EMS by default. There is no evidence that current staging area locations were strategically planned, but simply that space that was available via recent vacation or not otherwise being used, was offered as a location, for the most part, near the more populated areas of the County. There are currently areas of the County essentially uncovered and without any visible evidence that Orange County EMS has a presence in the area or community. Orange County EMS, like Law Enforcement is an on -going and at times almost continuous service that functions 24 hours a day throughout the entire County. Its services are far from occurring on a casual "periodic" or "sporadic" basis. This concern must be addressed as a long term issue. And, it must (in the long term) dovetail with the Response Time and Ambulance Availability issues previously addressed. Solutions for Local Government, Inc. 43