Two paramedics and two aid cars will serve the island around the clock when the proposed paramedic program change is implemented, according to fire commissioner Rex Stratton.
These details were some of the first to be revealed about the upcoming program change, which calls for Vashon Island Fire & Rescue paramedics to be absorbed into the South King County Medic One system. Medic One will then administer the program on the island, as it does throughout the rest of King County.
Stratton shared the information at a fire commissioners’ meeting last week. Additionally, he noted that paramedic teams will work in three-month rotations on the island. For the first year, however, an island paramedic will work with an off-island paramedic to ease the transition process.
The paramedics will also adhere to all of Medic One’s rules and guidelines, Stratton said, including that two paramedics will transport each patient needing advanced life support (ALS) services. This is different from Vashon’s current practice of relying on one paramedic and one emergency medical technician (EMT) to make the transfers.
Brigitte Schran Brown, an EMT with the department who is running for Stratton’s open seat on the board, attended the meeting and pressed him about how hospital transfers will be managed. Paramedic coverage during such times has been an ongoing concern among several members of the department, who have said they are worried Vashon will not have adequate staff to deal with life-threatening emergencies if two paramedics are off-island.
Back-up care coverage details are still being determined in the union negotiations, Stratton said, but he noted that Medic One’s chief, John Herbert, has assured him that Vashon will be well served under the new arrangement.
“We are not going to have lesser medical services,” Stratton said. “The system is not going to go backward.”
Reached after the meeting, Herbert confirmed that statement, saying he hopes to provide enough coverage on Vashon so that paramedics could respond to two ALS calls simultaneously, or nearly so.
“The goal is to have two levels of care, primary and back up,” he added.
In 2013, he said, Vashon paramedics provided 134 hospital transports, which averages out to two and a half transports each week. On Vashon this year so far, there have been 14 instances when ALS calls have overlapped, according to VIFR Assistant George Brown.
On the mainland, Herbert noted, 16 paramedics in two-person teams tend to 730,000 people at any given time and respond to 16,000 calls a year. By comparison on Vashon, the current plan is that a team of two paramedics, with back-up staff planned for, will tend to 11,000 people.
VIFR officials say they hope to invite Herbert to the island to discuss the plan at a public meeting as early as this fall, allowing islanders to learn more about the plan and express any concerns they may have.
Herbert said he believes public input is important and is happy to come to the island either before or after final details are resolved in union negotiations.
When he hears public feedback, he can either determine the plan is good enough, or more likely, he said, see if the public’s requests can be met.
Before any plan can be implemented, both VIFR commissioners and the King County Council must vote on it — a process that will take some time. Currently, Herbert said, he expects the transition will take place in the first quarter of next year at the earliest.
At VIFR, Assistant Chief Brown said he continues to welcome the proposed change.
“I have full confidence in the Medic One system. When they take over our system, they will continue to deliver the high quality service they have always delivered throughout the entire county,” he said.
