Upgrading EMS Services A Good Idea

There are few county services more instrumental in saving lives than its EMS force --and just like a fire department -- every second counts.

Understanding how crucial it is to dispatch an ambulance as quickly as possible, and considering how our population balloons in the winter, our EMS officials have made some needed changes to make sure that everyone gets served on time.

Next year, one of Highlands County's 13 volunteer fire departments will become the first to have on board full-time, certified paramedics serving on its fire trucks at all times.

That fire truck will essentially serve as an ambulance if other ambulances are tied up, so that a caller is not left waiting to be taken to the hospital.

That adjustment comes after the reopening of the Tomoka fire station, which put county EMS back to its full daily staffing level of eight ambulances.

Obviously, there's some good planning going on. What's also helping is the county's recent hiring of two paramedics and three EMTs.

Without the required personnel, there's no way an EMS operation can run the way it is supposed to, and that's not the only challenge. Just like other public safety jobs, workers always migrate to bigger cities and counties where there's more money so rural areas like ours have to measure up comparably.

But as our population grows, adding on to services like the EMS becomes more urgent.

Steve Plunkett Coltharp, the acting EMS director, has more ideas to streamline the operation and make it more efficient.

In the near future, Coltharp will make two more moves aimed at improving EMS response times by opening what he calls "day stations."

Instead of eight ambulance crews working out of six stations all the time, the eight ambulances will be stationed at eight sites between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m., he told Highlands Today.

One of the two ambulances at the main station on George Boulevard will be assigned to a "day station" at the West Sebring Volunteer Fire Department on Hammock Road. And one of the two ambulance crews at Avon Park will go to another "day station" at the Highlands Lakes Volunteer Fire Department, north of Avon Park.

These are good ways to decentralize the service so that all areas of the county are covered efficiently. Most of Highlands County's residents live in the unincorporated areas, some out there, on some rural stretch that is hard to reach in time if the ambulance is stationed in a downtown station.

We hope the county's EMS keeps growing and upgrading to meet our demand. Providing adequate and timely EMS service is one of those quality of life issues nobody wants to negotiate with.