It`s All About the Quality of Care

Wherever I travel around the country the message is the same—do more with less—so I wasn’t surprised to hear that echoed at the International Roundtable on Community Paramedicine (IRCP) held in May in England.

The IRCP facilitates discussions, meetings and research focused on designing systems that will ensure patients’ needs continue to be met in environments and circumstances where health services are less available and provision of care is increasingly challenging. Integral to this vision is the provision of services by paramedics in a expanded role.

Last year, the IRCP established a tool to help community-based systems determine their effectiveness, which can be found at www.IRCP.info. If you are considering the process of implementing community-based paramedicine, I encourage you to review this information.

Proponents of community paramedicine claim agencies that implement such programs see the following: cost savings, safer community-based assessment, reduced ED admissions, more comprehensive care, reduced ambulance transports; saved bed days and improved patient outcomes.

In 2010, the National Association of State EMS Officials said that community paramedicine increases patient access to primary and preventative care; provides wellness interventions within the medical home model; decreases emergency department utilization; saves healthcare dollars; and improves patient outcomes.

In a time of shrinking resources, reviewing whether community paramecine could improve the care you deliver makes a lot of sense. If you are going to follow through, just be sure to define what you’re doing, specify the outcome, measure it and, finally, ask “Did it make a difference?”

For more, see this month’s cover report in EMS World Magazine.

Scott Cravens, EMT-B, is the publisher of EMS World Magazine and EMSWorld.com.