Jessica Turnbull
The Pittsburgh Tribune Review
HARRISON, Pa. — After 25 years of existence, the UPMC St. Margaret Paramedic Response team is one of a dying breed.
The 10-member team, based out of the hospital near Aspinwall, was on life support nearly six years ago. Paramedic services, once prevalent in the area, have fallen victim to budget cuts. The only other hospital-based unit in the area is at the Alle-Kiski Medical Center in Natrona Heights, Harrison.
“With no money coming in, they close,” said David Bianco, coordinator of the St. Margaret team.
Bianco, a member of the team for 11 years, said the hospital considered shutting it down, citing budget concerns, while he was in Iraq in 2003. But once hospital executives saw the benefit of the program, they kept it, even adding vehicles and other support.
“The community really rallied around the program,” he said. “They love the idea that we are there and ready to respond quickly. I hope we’re around for another 25 years.”
The team aids local EMS services often stretched thin, from Aspinwall and Sharpsburg to West Deer. For 25 years, it has responded to emergency calls while developing ties with the area through community outreach and safety programs and classes.
Bianco is loaned out to the St. Margaret Foundation to oversee its automated external defibrillator donation program, which started in 1998. The paramedics team became involved with the AED program four years ago and since then has given away nearly 1,200 AEDs, saving an estimated 75 lives.
One of the ambulance services the team works with is Foxwall EMS, one of the last in Western Pennsylvania that continues as a volunteer-based service not affiliated with a fire department, said Gordon Fisher, Foxwall’s operations administrator.
“It’s hard to find people to do this job in the first place, and do it for nothing,” he said.
Fisher said the number of paramedics, who undergo more advanced training than emergency medical technicians, in the area has fallen, making it more difficult to maintain a full roster. The unit has eight paramedics and 43 EMTs, with Fisher and another staff member working as the only paid paramedics. The EMS is funded through subscriptions and donations.
The St. Margaret team is automatically dispatched on calls that require at least one paramedic or on calls where advanced lifesaving support as an aid to the Foxwall team is needed.
“It is a wonderful thing to have them,” Fisher said. “It is reassuring to have them around as a backup.”
Paramedic Brian Dankis, who has been with the team since 2005, said the paramedics usually go on six or seven calls during an eight-hour shift.
“We help Foxwall a lot because they are primarily a volunteer group,” he said. “We are a great asset to them.”
The St. Margaret team works with Parkview EMS, Lower Valley EMS and the City of Pittsburgh, which covers the Waterworks Mall area.
Paramedics drive SUVs, not ambulances, that are stocked with everything an ambulance has except the room to transport a gurney.
Members of the response team must be of a rare breed, Bianco said. They usually work with a partner but many times are alone at a scene if an EMT unit is swamped with calls. A team member might be with a patient at the scene for 30 minutes waiting for an available truck.
“You have to be able to work fast and be on your own,” Bianco said.
The team serves as a training program for medics coming out of school or medics who want to log enough hours on the job to remain certified, Bianco said.
C. Richard Packer started the team in 1984 with one truck. When Shaler police Sgt. Sean Frank joined in 1990, there were three full-time paramedics and 10 part-timers.
Frank was only with St. Margaret for a year, but the good work it’s responsible for is never far away. Today, four Shaler police cars have AEDs donated by the St. Margaret Foundation, one of which his neighbor needed during a medical emergency.
“I look out my window every morning and see the effect,” he said.
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