Written by Tanya Terry
A recent announcement that STAT EMS (Emergency Medical Service) will initiate dedicated response services to the city by October may put many Flint residents at ease.
In an effort to allow Flint residents to have faster, higher quality and equitable service, the City of Flint has entered into a tentative agreement with STAT EMS. Established in 2001, STAT EMS provides life support and medical transportation services. There will be no cost to the City of Flint for entering the partnership with STAT EMS. Instead, a non-monetary five-year contract is allowing the Genesee County 9-1-1 Consortium Board to recognize the agreement between the City of Flint, similarly as they have for other municipalities.
In addition, Banks EMS-the only Black-owned ambulance service in Genesee County- is the preferred subcontract provider for the City of Flint, to provide service when STAT EMS units are busy. Banks EMS launched in March.
Sheldon T. Banks of Banks EMS said he is looking forward to serving the residents of Flint and Genesee County.
“I feel like there was a need, and I felt like giving back to the city that’s been so good to me,” he added.
Banks said his goal was to get response time down to four minutes eventually.
“After four to six minutes, for a person going out of oxygen, brain death is irreversible,” he said.
Banks pointed out in Flint and throughout the nation there has been an increase of psychiatric cases and drug overdoses. He said this was a major concern for him.
“You have a lot of drug overdose deaths, and that’s what I’m trying to do is talk to people, provide counseling, give them avenues to at least get on the road to recovery,” he said.
Mayor Sheldon Neeley said the partnership is a unique opportunity where all the ingredients came in to make the recipe, and the meal is going to be successful for all residents in this great city.
“Partnering with STAT EMS and also Banks EMS provides a better level of coverage for the residents inside the city of Flint, especially when you have low to moderate income areas inside the city which gets usually overlooked for like services in the out-county area,” Neeley expressed. “So, this brings about a level of equality for the residents inside the city of Flint.”
Marc Lund, President & CEO of STAT EMS, stated today’s response times in the city of Flint “aren’t horrible when you look at the global average.” However, he said the response times are “predictably unpredictable.”
“On any given day they aren’t the same as the previous day,” Lund added.
Lund explained there have been multiple ambulance agencies working in the city of Flint, but they haven’t been coordinating their staffing plans. He elaborated on how emergency medical services have been operating in the city and the disadvantage of the absence of such coordination.
“So, if one ambulance company has people that call in sick on a particular day and they’re not going to have an ambulance in the city of Flint, they’re not telling me..they’re not telling Global Medical Response or Medstar ambulance or Patriot Ambulance or Swartz Ambulance…”
STAT EMS will now provide monthly data reporting to the City of Flint and will make quarterly reports at Flint City Council meetings. Lund said the goal at the time is to respond to priority 1 calls- the calls encompassing the most life-threatening emergencies-within 8 minutes, 90% of the time. For non-life-threatening priority 2 calls requiring lower-level emergency response, STAT EMS is committed to arriving in 11 minutes or less, 80% of the time and not to exceed 15 minutes. The goal is to have 10 ambulances available within the city of Flint during peak service times, according to Lund, who said data has been collected in order to make these types of decisions.
“The way that we feel is that emergency medical services are essential public services..,” said Lund.
Neeley referred to Flint City Council President Dennis Pfeiffer as the visionary behind this partnership. Pfeiffer, who has been advocating for dedicated ambulance service for the past eight months, told the Courier he had been listening to the community and realized ambulances had not been available to assist the firefighters.
“I know that the firefighters have a response time of seven to eight minutes, but they have to sit there and not be able to transport accident victims or people in need of emergency for up to 30 minutes until an ambulance is ready to show up,” Pfeiffer added.
He said knowing this was part of what derived the partnership, which ultimately came about after conversations between Pfeiffer, Chief Raymond Barton of the Flint Fire Department and Neeley.
Neeley stated the City of Flint is done with randomly assigned EMS providers from far outside the city limits trying to get to the city as rapidly as they can. Both STAT EMS and Banks EMS are headquartered in Flint. STAT EMS will operate out of City of Flint police mini stations, fire stations, and neighborhoods.
The contract was waiting for approval from Genesee County 911 at press time.
