By Fran Spielman
Chicago Sun Times
Copyright 2006 Chicago Sun-Times, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
The Chicago Fire Department would add up to six ambulances for non-emergency calls and 10 more advanced life support engines under an expansion of emergency medical services in the works that aldermen have been demanding.
This month, six spare or special events ambulances were pressed into basic life support (BLS) service to handle a surge of heat-related calls in the central business district.
Now, Fire Commissioner Ray Orozco Jr. wants to make that 50 percent increase in BLS ambulances permanent — and raise the number of advanced life support (ALS) engines from 40 to 50, City Hall sources said.
It would mark the largest expansion of emergency medical services in Chicago in six years.
TWO-TIERED SYSTEM
“The BLS program is a success and the commissioner intends to expand it,” said Fire Department spokesman Larry Langford.
Langford noted that 47 percent of the 24,000 EMS calls the Fire Department receives each month are for basic life support.
“The commissioner is going to continue the two-tier system because it’s the best way for a large city to handle its EMS requests. Many of our calls can be handled with a BLS ambulance. In fact, we find that on occasion we have to send ALS where a BLS ambulance would have been sufficient because we have no more BLS ambulances to send,” he said.
UPGRADED AMBULANCES
Pete Houlihan, EMS director for the Chicago Firefighters Union Local 2, said the city would be better served if the 12 BLS ambulances were converted to ALS.
“Then paramedics can respond and call-takers don’t have to go through a flip-chart” of questions aimed at determining what type of ambulance to send, he said.
“Adding BLS ambulances is not the answer. What it does is put a great burden on the call-takers to dispatch properly.”
Ald. Ginger Rugai (19th), who has led the charge for an ambulance upgrade, welcomed the expansion now in the works. “With the higher number of 911 calls, many of us have thought for a long time that we needed an increase in equipment.”
But Rugai said she, too, would be happier if Orozco was adding ALS ambulances with “more life-saving equipment and better-trained personnel.”
“Everybody deserves the best,” she said.
The Chicago Fire Department has a two-tiered system of ambulance service to reserve the most costly and sophisticated treatment for severely ill or injured patients.
There are 59 ALS ambulances, each staffed by two paramedics qualified to administer intravenous medication. ALS ambulances are stocked with drugs and equipped with heart-monitoring devices. The city also has 40 ALS engines with at least one paramedic, an EMT and advanced life support equipment.
In June 2000, the city added 12 BLS ambulances to handle non-life-threatening calls. They are staffed by emergency medical technicians who undergo less training. BLS ambulances do not have medicine or monitoring equipment. They are permitted to only transport BLS patients to hospitals.
In September 2003, the two-tiered system suffered a black eye at the hands of state inspectors.
STATE GOES AFTER AMBULANCES
Nine of the 12 BLS ambulances were taken out of service from two to five hours after inspectors found an “alarming” combination of unclean vehicles, under-trained employees and missing and expired equipment. Fourteen EMTs were yanked off their ambulances and retrained after they were unable to answer basic questions about how they would use equipment and under what circumstances.