EMS Staffing

Provided by EMERGENCY RESOURCE MANAGEMENT (ERM)

ERM is committed to ensuring Volunteer services keep their ambulances staffed and on the road. A partnership with ERM allows the service to continue to provide quality care with often greatly improved response times during critical hours (especially daytime). With experienced, caring and dedicated ERM staff integrated into your schedule, overburdened volunteers gain peace of mind and the ability to focus on those areas that often go by the wayside. Instead of scrambling to cover the schedule, administrators can be free to ensure regulatory and fiscal compliance, review QA, and work on strategic planning.

ERM can help your service develop a comprehensive, ongoing, structured plan to attract, recruit, train and develop new volunteer members. Improved staffing can help remove the “burn-out” factor from the current membership and increase retention of existing staff. The shortage of Volunteers nationwide is reaching crisis levels, and statistics continue to show that more EMTs are leaving the field every year than are becoming certified. Meanwhile, an aging population and increasing use of the Emergency Department for primary care is creating additional call volume for even the most rural areas. The majority of employees at ERM are volunteers in their hometowns and truly understand the challenges facing all of us.

SO HOW DOES IT WORK?

“The MSOs do a great job in providing manpower,” said Gary E. Wiemokly, former EMS Section Chief for the state Department of Public Health. “They offer a positive solution. The volunteer shortage still exists and is a little worse in the more rural areas, where there used to be folks readily available to volunteer.”

Connecticut’s aging population will continue to drive demand for paid EMS staff, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, which projects a 14 percent increase between 2008 and 2018. The national growth rate for paid EMS staff is projected at 9 percent.

“It’s becoming a bigger and bigger issue,” Robert Ziegler, CEO of ERM notes, “especially in this economy.”