By Sarah Chapman and Michelle Lang
Calgary Herald
Copyright 2008 Calgary Herald

CALGARY, Alberta — Only two or three ambulances were left to serve the whole city after long hospital waits tied up paramedics, sending Calgary EMS into an orange alert.

"It was bad. It was about as bad as we've ever seen," said Calgary EMS Chief Tom Sampson on Monday.

"We haven't had as busy a day for some time as far as hospital waits."

There are usually 43 ambulances operating in the city during peak hours.

At 6:45 p.m. on Sunday, the service went into yellow alert, meaning fewer than 11 ambulances were available.

At 10:30 p.m., another yellow alert was called and was held for 12 hours straight. In that time, six orange alerts were also called, meaning fewer than eight ambulances were available.

"During the orange alerts, there were a couple of times when we dropped down to only two or three units available," said Sampson.

A red alert means there are no available ambulances left in the city.

When alerts are called, paramedics may be required to abandon patients already at the hospital to get back onto the street. While Calgary Health Region paramedics are kept on staff to take over in busy hospital hallways, there aren't enough to go around, said Sampson.

"You're safest if you're sitting in a hospital, and you're at the next level of safe if you're sitting in the hallway or the waiting room of a hospital, but you're at the greatest risk if you're in the community on your own," he said.

"Our units need to get back out and handle the call volume on the street."

Sampson said the average wait time for paramedics at the hospital was 94 minutes on Sunday.

In 2007, the average was 62 minutes. The ideal time is 30 minutes.

In December, the system was changed to increase the number of ambulances available when calling an alert. The change was made to give the service more time to prevent a red alert.

Sampson believes the key to solving the crunch involves having the health region move patients from emergency into wards as soon as possible.

Other solutions, said Sampson, include continuing to work on current response plans, and, ideally, having more paramedics and more ambulances in the service.

The Calgary Health Region acknowledged its emergency departments have been very busy in recent days -- a common problem after the holiday season when physicians' offices tend to be closed and patients put their health concerns on hold for Christmas.

Sheila Rougeau, a spokeswoman for the health authority, conceded delays facing paramedics at hospitals are "too long." But she said wait times for paramedics to admit patients to hospital have dipped from 131 minutes in the first week of January last year to 109 minutes during the same period this year.

"This is too long and we know that and we're working hard to curb those times," she said.

Rougeau noted the CHR has purchased four patient transfer vans, reducing the health body's reliance on city ambulances to transport patients.

Last week, Calgary's fire chief expressed concern about a five per cent increase in response times.

Ald. Joe Ceci, who sits on the community and protective services committee, says he will listen closely as fire Chief Bruce Burrell presents findings from an analysis of service levels to the committee Wednesday morning.

"Obviously, the chief and fire department are quite concerned to bring it up to council's attention via a report and to come forward and speak to it," Ceci said.

"It's an issue, obviously, and it's one I think we'll take seriously."

Burrell will ask alderman to approve 18 new benchmarks in hopes of improving public safety after the study found that Calgary has fallen behind the national average in several areas.

The number of full-time uniformed personnel per 1,000 population is 0.955 in Calgary, below the national average of 0.981.

The study also found that the city's 33 fire stations protect about 31,000 people each, compared with the national average of 28,041.