(rdnewsNOW file photo)

By Josh Hall (Twitter: @Vancan19)

BUDGET 2020: HOSPITAL ADVOCACY

Ambulances getting bottlenecked as Red Deer Hospital expansion wait persists

Jan 10, 2020 | 6:13 PM

Red Deer’s Chief of Emergency Services says there are major problems with how ambulances are able to function within the city.

Asked what he would request from the province to alleviate the problem though, Ken McMullen points not to more ambulances, but Red Deer’s desperate need for expansion of hospital services.

Responding to comments made during Operating Budget talks Friday for continued advocacy on that front, McMullen says the potential number of people ambulances and paramedics can help isn’t being maximized.

“What happens very frequently is that ambulances — ours, but also others within the region — are stuck in hospital waiting areas until such time a bed is available. There’s a ripple effect; they have to free up a bed on the third floor to free up a bed on the second, and then to free up a bed in emergency,” he explains. “It is a big picture issue which we face every single day.”

McMullen says ambulance personnel, be it a driver or paramedic, abide by protocol which states they must wait with a patient if they’ve already provided some sort of medical intervention. But while they wait, ambulances pile up.

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“Then we have to rely on additional ambulances from within Red Deer or from outside our city that have to come in. They could be in hospital wait rooms for five or six hours waiting with patients. On average, we’re at about three hours,” McMullen says.

Compounding the issue, he continues, is that when Red Deer’s five full-time ambulances become unavailable, they end up using fire engines equipped with life-saving equipment. The issue there is then fire trucks are not able to respond to fire calls.

Red Deer’s ambulances also get called to other communities.

“It’s every day. As soon as one of our units goes out — it’s called flexing — they’ll bring in another unit from elsewhere, but again, if you went to the hospital today, you’d see probably six ambulances waiting in the outside ambulance bay.”

Add in the oftentimes needed transportation of a patient to Edmonton or Calgary, and personnel are spending an even more exorbitant amount of time outside their own community.

Paul Goranson, the City’s Protective Services Director, explains that there is a contract with the province to provide those ambulance services in Red Deer.

He says when situations arise as explained by McMullen, this can drastically drive up costs related to overtime pay for paramedics and other ambulance staff.