ERC ambulance service responds to nearly 1K calls in 2014

The ambulance service in Cheyenne County responded to 960 calls in 2014, up 40 over the previous year.

Randy Meininger, manager of ground ambulance services at Regional West – which operates Emergency Response Care in Sidney – delivered an annual report to the Cheyenne County Board of Commissioners this week.

Regional West first began operating the service in Cheyenne County in 2002, Meininger explained. The current agreement, inked in 2005, continues until 2018.

ERC has a staff of 11.5 full-time equivalent employees, he said, and operates three ambulances in the county.

In 2014, Cheyenne County paid ERC $120,000, and the City of Sidney paid $71,000.

About a quarter of the calls for assistance last year resulted in no transport – where an ambulance responded but no patient was transported.

Meininger said that number could increase in the future, as the county's population ages and continues to grow.

Elderly populations that don't have family nearby are relying more on public safety, he explained.

Twenty of the calls that did result in a transport required the transport of more than one person from the scene, Meininger said.

That's important because federal regulations put in place last summer mandate only one patient can be transported in new ambulances, he noted.

Commissioner Steve Olson asked if the regulation would apply to ambulances acquired before the new rule.

"Anything purchased prior to is compliant," Meininger replied.

For 87 percent of the calls in 2014, an ambulance was en route within 2 minutes of being paged – and for 71 percent of the calls, on scene within 15 minutes.

Meininger said for cardiac patients, time is paramount.

"It's important to work with the public to get them to recognize heart attacks and strokes so we're en route quickly," he said.