By Barry Porterfield
Pauls Valley Daily Democrat
PAULS VALLEY, Okla. — This is the week: the Pauls Valley area is getting a brand new ambulance service.
The first day of a new era came Sept. 1 as American Medical Response, Inc., which is part of Global Medical Response, officially stepped in, ending an eight-year run of service from Mercy EMS. In fact, it’s been Mercy operating ambulance services ever since Pauls Valley General Hospital closed in 2018.
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Back in June, AMR submitted the lowest of four bids, ultimately getting the approval of the Pauls Valley City Council as the new service provider for the local ambulance district, which includes the Pauls Valley, Whitebead and Paoli areas.
AMR’s bid was for an annual cost of $560,000, which includes a 3% increase each of the five years of the contract.
Steve Bates, AMR’s regional director for Oklahoma and north Texas, said state licenses, staff and trucks have been put in place and are ready to roll from the same site formerly housing Mercy on South Chickasaw in Pauls Valley.
“Mercy did a great job and provided a great service for the community in the many years it was here. Mercy has been a great partner to AMR and that will continue,” Bates said. “At 8 a.m. Sept. 1, we will take over the service and are moving in. We will provide the same level of service, the same great care.”
With AMR “ready to go,” the service provides two ambulances, two EMTs, which are emergency medical technicians, and two paramedics.
Bates said the service coming in gets a bonus by having an operations manager on site capable of stepping in when options beyond the two ambulances are needed.
“We’ll provide a great service to the community, plus we have an operations manager who has access to a quick response vehicle,” he said. “He’ll be able to respond when both ambulances are out on service. He’s a trained paramedic who can provide an option for life-saving care.”
AMR ambulance services is also associated with the Air Evac Lifeteam helicopter ambulances housed at Pauls Valley’s airport.
“GMR is the largest air and ground EMS provider in the United States,” Bates said. “At the core of it, we’re still a small-town service. We’re community-based and strive to tie into the communities we serve and be a part of them.”
An American Medical Response website shows it’s a “leading provider of emergency medical services, delivering quality pre-hospital healthcare to thousands of communities across the United States.”
“Our teams of highly trained and dedicated medical professionals partner with large and small hospital systems, counties and municipalities to ensure patients receive the right level of care, right when they need it,” the website states.
“AMR is the flagship ground ambulance solution of Global Medical Response, giving us access to vast resources on both a national and local level. We operate a fleet of more than 7,000 ground ambulances and support vehicles equipped for 911 emergency services or interfacility transports, including basic life support, advanced life support and critical care capabilities that extend hospital-level care out into the community.”
The Global Medical Response site shows it had more than 5 million patient encounters last year in all 50 U.S. states and around the globe.
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