Mayor of Calgary - Naheed Nenshi, Mayor of Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo - Don Scott, Mayor of Lethbridge - Chris Spearman, Mayor of Red Deer - Tara Veer. (City of Red Deer)

By Sheldon Spackman

In Support Of Local Dispatch

Mayors urge health minister to cancel EMS dispatch consolidation

Sep 24, 2020 | 5:35 PM

Red Deer Mayor Tara Veer was joined by her counterparts from Calgary, Lethbridge, and Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo in Edmonton on Thursday to renew their call in keeping integrated municipal ambulance dispatch in place for their communities.

Since the announcement from Alberta Health Services on Aug. 4 regarding plans to consolidate EMS Dispatch Services to three provincial centres in Peace River, Edmonton, and Calgary, the mayors of the affected municipalities have been working together to stop these changes.

On Thursday, the mayors and fire chiefs of the four municipalities met with the Minister of Health, Tyler Shandro, and Minister of Municipal Affairs, Tracy Allard to express their opposition towards the planned consolidation.

Tara Veer says she and her fellow mayors shared their regional and local perspectives as to why local ambulance dispatch is so important to positive patient outcomes in their respective communities.

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“As an outcome of the meeting, the minister committed to reviewing the material that we submitted both in the verbal presentation, as well as our written submission and getting back to us in terms of any subsequent questions he may have,” recalls Veer. “There was not a specific commitment in terms of our formal ask of the minister, which is to overturn AHS for the fifth time on this issue.”

Veer says the municipalities involved and the regions they represent remain strongly opposed to EMS dispatch consolidation.

“Ambulance dispatch should be kept local and that is in the interests of patient outcomes for all Albertans,” adds Veer.

She notes, however, the critical importance of a timely response from the minister.

“AHS gave notice in early August and are actively implementing their decision as we speak,” remarks Veer. “We ask the minister to please pause the AHS implementation and to review the decisions in a timely way and to ultimately overturn it. And we did indicate that we would continue to pursue the public safety interest on this matter, up to the January deadline that AHS has articulated to us.”

The key factors, according to Veer, are that seconds matter in life and death circumstances.

“Coordinated, integrated municipal dispatch is the most timely and effective emergency response system in terms of the spectrum of options that are available,” declares Veer. “We currently have a highly effective system that puts the patient first in critical emergency situations.”

Veer further points out that fire medic response often arrives first, before AHS ambulance in many critical or emergency situations.

“The minister asked a lot of questions around that specific component,” reveals Veer. “In Red Deer, 40 per cent of the time, Red Deer fire units arrived first, 50 per cent of the time Calgary fire units arrived first, 19 per cent of the time Lethbridge fire units arrived first, and 60 per cent of the time, Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo fire units arrived first.”

Veer says there were very specific reasons as to why Red Deer, Lethbridge, and the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo were designated as satellite centres in 2014.

“One, based on population concentration, and based on geography and isolation factors as in the case of Wood Buffalo,” explains Veer. “And Red Deer’s central positioning on the QE2 corridor, as well as the volume of calls and demographic factors of various municipalities.”

Veer says integrated dispatch is essential to the City’s ability to integrate emergency response and is a far more efficient use of public resources.

“If dispatch is removed from municipalities, we would no longer have the ability to coordinate.”

Health Minister Tyler Shandro says it was a good meeting and he will consider what the four mayors have told him.