Commissioners Proclaim EMS Week

Today, during their regular Monday afternoon meeting the Cumberland County Board of Commissioners proclaimed May 20th- May 26th as Emergency Medical Services (EMS) Week!  The purpose of this week is to recognize those in all steps of the EMS process from the dispatcher taking the initial call and offer pre-arrival instructions, to the EMT's and Medic rendering pre-hospital care, then the Emergency Room staff at hospitals.

Pennsylvania is fortunate to have a well trained, creative and top notch EMT and Paramedic force and is known for this across the nation.  T his top notch force is the product of Pennsylvania's large rural population.  There are not hospitals around every corner in most areas of our state, in fact for many people it's a 20-30 minute ambulance ride to a hospital.  That being said, patient care and a patients life is often in an EMT and paramedic's hands for sometime, meaning they have to be on top of their game and confident in their skills.

Cumberland County EMS units were dispatched to 29,419 calls in 2011.  These calls were not only in Cumberland County, but also to provide mutual aid services to several neighboring counties.  The EMS force in Cumberland County is comprised of volunteer and career EMS staff and firefighters and police officers with varying levels of EMS training.  Cumberland County is currently served by 11 EMS companies which staff 22 individual stations.

In light of EMS Week, the Board of Commissioners also recognized 10 EMT's who will soon be receiving Clinical Save Commendations from the Emergency Health Services Federation.
The following EMT's were recognized:

East Pennsboro Ambulance Service

Christopher Bowers, EMT (2 Clinical Save Commendations)

Jonathan House, EMT

John Myers, EMT

West Shore EMS

Mark Boland, EMT-P

Dewitt James Cline, EMT

Janette Cota, EMT

Devin Flickinger, EMT-P

Robert Houser, EMT

Steven Stilo, EMT-P

Charlene Wood, EMT-P (2 Clinical Save Commendations)

A “clinical save” as defined by the Emergency Health Services Federation must meet the following criteria to be considered for commendation.

-          Must be primarily involved in the pre-hospital clinical care of a patient

-          Patient initially presented to pre-hospital personnel pulseless and/or apneic

-          Appropriate ALS and/or BLS intervention and treatment were rendered

-          Patient was transported to the hospital and subsequently discharged from the hospital without significant neurological impairment

Be sure to thank an EMS provider next week!  Twitter hashtag #ThankAnEMT