Maine’s EMS Crisis
MILBRIDGE — Mainers face a crisis that could result in the loss of lives that could be otherwise saved.
The state of Maine is facing an unprecedented EMS crisis that worsens by the day.
Nancy Parritt, the service representative of petit Manan ambulance corp, says that most of the crisis can be attributed to a lack of funding provided for ems crews by the towns they serve.
The reason emergency medical services rely on their towns for the majority of their funding is most insurance providers only cover up to 80% of the cost of an ambulance leaving a large portion of the bill that often goes unpaid. “We did a financial analysis and if you’re doing more than eighteen hundred calls a year you lose bout 400 to 450 dollars every time you go out on a call. If you’re doing less than 800 calls a year you’re losing 2,000 dollars every time you go on a call,” says Rick Petrie, the chief operations officer of Northeast Mobile Health.
The lack of funding often results in understaffing.
Low staffing means that when one EMS crew gets multiple calls in their town, they then must rely on the help of other crews in surrounding areas.
However, if and when those other crews respond to help a neighboring town, they also leave their town at risk.
Renne Gray, the service chief of Moosabec ambulance, says, “When another emergency comes in we have to cover each other so pleasant river covers, petit mana covers their area when they’re out we all back each other up and it’s a crucial system”.
Parritt says that without more funding ambulance corps like hers could have to close.
She says that if any of these stations were to go under it would mean that a town with multiple emergency calls could have to wait hours for a crew to arrive and in some cases that could mean the difference between life and death.
“We had a situation the other day from Milbridge at critical run and our backup unit that would be covering this area at the time they had Moosabeck and that would have taken at least forty-five minutes,” says Parritt.
Parritt says that there will be a meeting on Thursday afternoon in Columbia Falls in an attempt to educate town officials about the situation and gather support from the public.
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