National UHF Medcom Frequencies

[FireAlarmAndDispatch]

My very first receiver was the Yaesu VR-5000 which was a really cool Christmas present, I programed all the fire service frequencies then all ten UHF medcom frequencies & all was good with the scanning world, fast forward ten years & the fire service frequencies are still somewhat busy however the UHF medcom frequencies are practically dead, a search of several states in the RR database reveals that an overwhelming number of former UHF medcom users have all migrated to their respective city, county & state jurisdictional trunked systems, I've also noticed that a number of state forestry fire protection agencies have also migrated to their respective state trunked systems, these agencies were lucky enough to be allocated their own dedicated frequencies so why the migration? I thought wise men never attempted to fix something that was never broke or are the communications infrastructure salesmen that good?

 

[krokus]

A lot of the information that used to be passed on Med Com channels is being passed via cellphone, these days. Some of the channels might be used in large scale incidents, so agencies from multiple areas can communicate.

Sent via Tapatalk

 

[mmckenna]

I thought wise men never attempted to fix something that was never broke or are the communications infrastructure salesmen that good?

Yes, some sales guys are that good. In addition, a lot of agencies are having their radio system decisions decided by politicians rather than people that understand.

Politicians + slick salesmen = rapidly drained public coffers and fancy radio systems that are not always necessary.

In other words, your tax dollars hard at work.

 

[ko6jw_2]

I think in some areas there were privacy concerns about giving patient information over unencrypted radio channels. These were mostly baseless because the patient is not identified.

In Santa Barbara County the medical frequencies are very active. Mostly used by AMR Ambulance, but also by CALSTAR and county helicopters.

They do use cell phones at times.

Also, the treatments that paramedics are authorized to do in the field have greatly expanded and things which required a doctor's authorization can be done at the discretion of the medic on scene. This has reduced radio traffic.

We have a county wide EMS dispatch system on MED 10. Each hospital is assigned a Medcom channel. The system uses linked repeaters to cover the entire county. It took a long time to implement, but it works reasonably well now.

 

[INDY72]

Its not just slick salesmen and corrupt politicos. With conventional systems, each user wanting to have an private ch needs its own freq. With an TRS, that is history. You can now take an much larger group of users and have them all sharing fewer freqs. You also have an wider range of interop options (assuming proper training and planning) and security options as well. Trunking Systems are more efficient spectrum wise than having to get a buttload of separate freqs for every single use. In the "golden era" of things, you had to have separate freqs for FD dispatch, FG's, EMS dispatch, MED's, HEAR's, PD dispatch, TAC's, Car to Car's, DPW dispatch, OP's, etc, etc... Now on an TRS, instead of having at least 2 to 3 freqs for each and every user in an area, you can have as few as 5 for everyone. And that's just putting the simplified explanation down. And with Statewide TRS's, it makes streamlining communications actually easier now. Proper implementation of these systems means bye bye for everyone using different bands, loads of spectrum, battles over who can talk to who and on and on. This FD on VHF Low that one on VHF High, others on UHF, EMS needing both VHF High and UHF, same for LEA's..... All requiring differing radios for each band, etc... Not anymore. One could use this argument for HAM guys too. HAM has finally found the digital age but still has not streamlined fully into cohesive use of spectrum. Yes you are getting there with multiband radios, internet/satellite nodes and wider area linking, but you still have needs for multiple communications abilities that require multiple radios. And you run into the same issues as public safety and business do. Costs. You want to talk to X on one band, Y on another, Z on another, A in another state, B in another country possibly. It isn't cheap to get the right gear, with the right power, and the right capabilities. Not to mention repeaters, computer gear, tower space, and so on. Maybe one day everyone will get it together both in the business, public safety, and amateur arenas. Tech advances literally daily in the communications field, and that is an good thing. But then again, maybe everyone actually working together to get things done right is still an pipe dream. Only time will tell.

 

[rapidcharger]

There's a name for it. It's called the race to waste.

Scanning as we knew it is gone for a lot of people. You're lucky if you can even listen to them on trunking system now

 

[ecps92]

All depends on your Region. YMMV based on locality-by-locality.

UHF C-Med is still in Wide use here in MA and CT
VT, NH and ME still are VHF
RI has migrated many to the state TRS

A lot of the information that used to be passed on Med Com channels is being passed via cellphone, these days. Some of the channels might be used in large scale incidents, so agencies from multiple areas can communicate.

Sent via Tapatalk

 

[SCPD]

Its not just slick salesmen and corrupt politicos. With conventional systems, each user wanting to have an private ch needs its own freq. With an TRS, that is history. You can now take an much larger group of users and have them all sharing fewer freqs. You also have an wider range of interop options (assuming proper training and planning) and security options as well. Trunking Systems are more efficient spectrum wise than having to get a buttload of separate freqs for every single use. In the "golden era" of things, you had to have separate freqs for FD dispatch, FG's, EMS dispatch, MED's, HEAR's, PD dispatch, TAC's, Car to Car's, DPW dispatch, OP's, etc, etc... Now on an TRS, instead of having at least 2 to 3 freqs for each and every user in an area, you can have as few as 5 for everyone. And that's just putting the simplified explanation down. And with Statewide TRS's, it makes streamlining communications actually easier now. Proper implementation of these systems means bye bye for everyone using different bands, loads of spectrum, battles over who can talk to who and on and on. This FD on VHF Low that one on VHF High, others on UHF, EMS needing both VHF High and UHF, same for LEA's..... All requiring differing radios for each band, etc... Not anymore. One could use this argument for HAM guys too. HAM has finally found the digital age but still has not streamlined fully into cohesive use of spectrum. Yes you are getting there with multiband radios, internet/satellite nodes and wider area linking, but you still have needs for multiple communications abilities that require multiple radios. And you run into the same issues as public safety and business do. Costs. You want to talk to X on one band, Y on another, Z on another, A in another state, B in another country possibly. It isn't cheap to get the right gear, with the right power, and the right capabilities. Not to mention repeaters, computer gear, tower space, and so on. Maybe one day everyone will get it together both in the business, public safety, and amateur arenas. Tech advances literally daily in the communications field, and that is an good thing. But then again, maybe everyone actually working together to get things done right is still an pipe dream. Only time will tell.

The picture you paint may work in areas with gentle topography. In the west 800 MHz does not carry well in the more rugged topography covering much of the western U.S. California attempted to covert its state park agency and department of transportation to 800 MHz on two different systems, but could not complete the effort in the northwest coastal portion of the state. They left the DOT on low band and installed a new VHF high system for state parks. 800 MHz signals are attenuated by thick forests of short needled conifer trees. The proposed 800 MHz system for DOT included more than a quadrupling of repeater sites to cover deep canyons and extensive forests.

The federal government will not be shifting to 800 MHz systems as they have no allocations in that band. Federal land management agencies are using VHF high and won't be changing. The largest cache of radio equipment used for disasters uses VHF high for most communications, with some use of UHF frequencies for links and logistics. VHF high covers rugged terrain and remote locations federal land management agencies cover that other bands can't. That won't be changing in the next 15-20 years anyway.

In urban areas systems of radio sites that are able to patch one frequency band with another are in place, however, the high number of sites in the west, operated by federal, state, county and local agencies preclude this type of operation. The high number of sites reflect the terrain and remote characteristics of the areas they cover.

VHF high is the band of wildland firefighting and local fire departments that send apparatus and personnel for mutual aid have VHF mobiles and handhelds installed in their rigs. Systems must be simple and radios easy to clone. Trunked system don't fit that bill.

Rural areas often have interoperability on VHF high already. High channel capacity radios enabled this 30 years ago. There have been some major failures and unnecessary expenditures when slick salesmen sell complicated systems to unsuspecting and unknowing counties and cities. OpenSky anyone?

Each county in the two county region I live in has a unique EMS radio system. Each consists of a single repeater pair and 5-10 CTCSS controlled repeaters. Each have mobiles with the 10 channel EMS system in them both routine and emergency patient transfers to ER's and hospitals in out of region hospitals. I would not be surprised if most communications with out of region medical facilities occurs on cell phones. I haven't had a look inside the paramedic units of each county in recent years to see if the UHF radios are still there.

 

[INDY72]

VHF trunks quite nicely. And combines with other bands nicely. MOSWIN, TACN, AK's system, and others. As I said, with properly set up planning, it could be done, and yes, its an good idea to have set aside conventional fire ground/tacs. The problem with a lot of systems is not the bands used, its planning. That's where unfortunately the biggest issues always lie. You don't have the proper people getting in the right ears. Anyway, as the original discussion was about the nationwide UHF MED nets, might as well point this out, they are individual systems in use at various medical facilities, and EMS agencies, not an multi state single network. Probably should have stated that to begin with and ended the thread logically instead of going into it further. Guilty of that one.

 

[signal500]

My very first receiver was the Yaesu VR-5000 which was a really cool Christmas present, I programed all the fire service frequencies then all ten UHF medcom frequencies & all was good with the scanning world, fast forward ten years & the fire service frequencies are still somewhat busy however the UHF medcom frequencies are practically dead, a search of several states in the RR database reveals that an overwhelming number of former UHF medcom users have all migrated to their respective city, county & state jurisdictional trunked systems, I've also noticed that a number of state forestry fire protection agencies have also migrated to their respective state trunked systems, these agencies were lucky enough to be allocated their own dedicated frequencies so why the migration? I thought wise men never attempted to fix something that was never broke or are the communications infrastructure salesmen that good?

They are still in use every day here in northwest Florida. Escambia County is using 462.975 for their main dispatch channel.

 

[rapidcharger]

The picture you paint may work in areas with gentle topography. In the west 800 MHz does not carry well in the more rugged topography covering much of the western U.S. California attempted to covert its state park agency and department of transportation to 800 MHz on two different systems, but could not complete the effort in the northwest coastal portion of the state. They left the DOT on low band and installed a new VHF high system for state parks. 800 MHz signals are attenuated by thick forests of short needled conifer trees. The proposed 800 MHz system for DOT included more than a quadrupling of repeater sites to cover deep canyons and extensive forests.

The federal government will not be shifting to 800 MHz systems as they have no allocations in that band. Federal land management agencies are using VHF high and won't be changing. The largest cache of radio equipment used for disasters uses VHF high for most communications, with some use of UHF frequencies for links and logistics. VHF high covers rugged terrain and remote locations federal land management agencies cover that other bands can't. That won't be changing in the next 15-20 years anyway.

In urban areas systems of radio sites that are able to patch one frequency band with another are in place, however, the high number of sites in the west, operated by federal, state, county and local agencies preclude this type of operation. The high number of sites reflect the terrain and remote characteristics of the areas they cover.

VHF high is the band of wildland firefighting and local fire departments that send apparatus and personnel for mutual aid have VHF mobiles and handhelds installed in their rigs. Systems must be simple and radios easy to clone. Trunked system don't fit that bill.

Rural areas often have interoperability on VHF high already. High channel capacity radios enabled this 30 years ago. There have been some major failures and unnecessary expenditures when slick salesmen sell complicated systems to unsuspecting and unknowing counties and cities. OpenSky anyone?

Each county in the two county region I live in has a unique EMS radio system. Each consists of a single repeater pair and 5-10 CTCSS controlled repeaters. Each have mobiles with the 10 channel EMS system in them both routine and emergency patient transfers to ER's and hospitals in out of region hospitals. I would not be surprised if most communications with out of region medical facilities occurs on cell phones. I haven't had a look inside the paramedic units of each county in recent years to see if the UHF radios are still there.

That all makes perfect sense and I don't disagree with a single word of it.
Except that none of this stuff has in any way hindered the development of many large trunking systems in areas of conifer needles, rugged topography, funding or interoperability concerns. People should feel lucky for every day they have left of their medcom channels.

 

[SCPD]

To chime in on the med channel regards, I know for fact NM recently decided to continue keeping the licensing and registering in future on the uhf med channels with conventional use only in event if there ever was a change. It was debated after a pitch salesman kept dooming and glooming the uhf band pushing the 700 trunked sales. Unless the fcc forced users off uhf they plan to keep uhf med channels in NM and not let the licenses expire. It is also to my knowledge anything sensitive is called in or used on a larger trs such like albuquerque or hobbs that has capability for the secure issues for patients.