Does Denver EMS have to meet NFPA guidelines?
Alert sent on ambulance times
The unusual warning from the Denver auditor's office comes before a review of the paramedic system is finished.
By Christopher N. Osher
The Denver Post
Denver's paramedic division may be violating response-time standards it is required by law to meet, Denver Auditor Dennis Gallagher's office said Thursday in a special alert.
The auditor's office is conducting a performance audit of the paramedic system, but took the unusual step of issuing the alert before the full audit is completed.
The alert, written by director of audit services Kip Memmott, notes Denver adopted 2007 National Fire Protection Association standards as part of the Denver Building and Fire Code.
"As a result, the city is required to minimally adhere to NFPA standards associated with emergency medical response," Memmott wrote.
"Specifically, the NFPA standards are not reflected in the city's 2008 operating agreement with Denver Health, meaning the city may not be in compliance with the legal requirement that they adhere to these emergency-response standards," Memmott stated.
Dee Martinez, a spokeswoman with Denver Health Medical Center, said the hospital had not yet seen the audit alert and could not comment without further investigation.
Memmott said in his alert that NFPA standards require 90 percent of all emergency ambulance responses to be completed within nine minutes.
The city's contract with Denver Health specifies 85 percent of emergency responses must occur within eight minutes and 59 seconds.
In addition, the alert stated that the NFPA standard refers to the time from which a call is dispatched to the time when an advanced life-support system arrives on the scene.
The hospital, however, begins its countdown when an ambulance actually becomes available for service, and paramedics have said often there is a lag because all the ambulances are tied up on other calls.
In response to past criticisms, Denver Health officials have stressed that the Denver Fire Department dispatches basic life-support providers who arrive at the scene well before paramedic crews. The Fire Department personnel, though, are not allowed to administer medicine. The paramedics are.
Memmott sent the alert to Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper and all City Council members. He also alerted Safety Manager Al LaCabe, City Attorney David Fine, Fire Chief Nick Nuanes and Environmental Health Manager Nancy Severson.
http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_10740030
