For years, residents of rural Orange County have had to wait too long for ambulances in emergencies, sometimes as long as 45 minutes.
But a new initiative is looking to reduce ambulance response times countywide — which, in crisis situations, could be the difference between life and death.
On Nov. 20, the Orange County Board of County Commissioners approved approximately $5 million of improvement expenditures. Along with ongoing reforms to the system, this money could increase the speed at which ambulances reach patients.
“Right now, the average response time is 8 minutes and 23 seconds,” said Scott Lodge, Orange County Emergency Services quality assurance officer. “It has been going down steadily for the last four months.”
A March 2010 report cited Orange County Emergency Services’ average response time to be 17 minutes.
“Sometimes run times are as long as 30 or 45 minutes,” said Commissioner Earl McKee, who chairs the workgroup to reduce EMS response times.
“When you have a broken finger, it’s not a big deal, but anything over 12 minutes is a serious matter when it comes to heart attacks or strokes.”
Lodge said Emergency Services has been working to improve times since February, when the workgroup was established.
“In May, we put GPS devices in all five of our ambulances, so we’re always dispatching the closest unit,” he said. “And sometime in July, we switched from 24-hour shifts to 12-hour shifts for paramedics, so no one is allowed to sleep.”