Wake up call

Wake up call

By Alan Perry

October 11, 2015

The Fire department acknowledges that it’s EMS SOP’s largely have not been updated since the consolidation of its Fire & EMS Divisions nearly 20 years ago. The rapid changes to the practice of EMS, including high performance EMS, crew resource management and position assignments brought a group together to re-evaluate and create operating guidelines for EMS, as well as develop training, deployment and feedback mechanisms. Our current guidance comes from the old SOP’s, a handful of Medical Directives and the regional EMS Protocols. Most other departments rely on these same mechanisms locally, nationally, there seems to be a tendency to develop agency/system specific protocols and SOG/SOP’s by agencies that find this lacking. This Department is pushing into new territory with its EMS activities, rapidly adopting practices and methods that have proven success with the goal of saving as many lives as possible with the latest science and technology. The regional protocols have not kept up, and the complexity of EMS operations has increased as well. The field forces are expected to keep up with these changes and be prepared to apply these new skills without any additional training resources being made available. The Department hopes that developing their own resources (protocols/ SOP’s/etc.) will give those in the field the resources they require to reference and be prepared to use these new tools.

A quick internet search reveals that there are many good models of EMS and agency specific protocols/ SOP’s & SOG’s. What I find lacking is training plans for communication to, instruction of, and feedback for providers. In fact it seems many departments, while communicating the requirements of maintaining certification and/or licensure to their providers are quite forthcoming, there is no reciprocal statement defining the agencies commitment or responsibility for training to its providers. While I am happy to embark on that task, I feel it will be futile since any attempt to compel even a willing organization to commit funding & staffing at any defined level will likely not be supported.

So, before I attempt anything like that, I ask that anyone with a similar circumstance take a moment and reply with their experience (especially if successful) so I can at least move forward with reasonable expectations.

Thanks,

Alan