Lack of Money Keeps Kentucky County in Reduced ALS Service

PENLDETON COUNTY, Kentucky (WCPO) - If two people with two medical emergencies call Pendleton County 911 at the exact same moment, only one will get an ambulance from within the county. The other will have to wait for help from the next-nearest ambulance district in Harrison County — 25 minutes away on a good traffic day. As WCPO reported in June, the problem in Pendleton County isn’t a lack of ambulances: They have two capable of providing what’s known as advanced life support (ALS) care. It’s a lack of money. A $175,000 ambulance district deficit, fueled by a stagnant tax base and an increased number of calls for service, has forced the county to take one ALS ambulance out of service for 12 hours at a time five days a week. According to interim ambulance director Greg Pollard, the shortage has produced at least 10 recent situations in which simultaneous callers got responses from two different counties. MORE  
Source: JEMS: Journal of Emergency Medical Services News - Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: News Administration and Leadership Source Type: news