At the recent Let’s Talk event, Mayor and Council were joined by representatives from Northern Health, the Tumbler Ridge Fire Department, and BC Emergency Health Services (BCEHS), who operate the Ambulance here in Tumbler Ridge.
Representing this latter group was Community Paramedic Joan Zimmer, Jonathan Brnjas, Manager of Clinical Operation for BCEHS, and Deb Trumbley, Director for Patient Care Delivery in Northern BC.
Trumbley says that right now is a time of transition for BCEHS. “We are coming out of Covid and we have a new collective agreement,” she says. “Both of those are really significant. First, the BC government has made permanent the temporary resources that they put in place for us during Covid. This includes a 12 hour car in Chetwynd and an additional 12 hour car in Dawson Creek. Both of these do get used to support Tumbler Ridge when needed. So these are new resources that have been added.”
In addition, says Trumbley, the staffing model is changing. In November of 2021, the Tumbler Ridge station moved from a so-called Kilo station to a Scheduled on Call (SOC) station.
As a Kilo station, paramedics would carry a pager, and get paid $2/hour for their time, until a call came in. Once a call came in, they would get paid at regular wages for a minimum of four hours. This made it hard to find people who were willing to work as paramedics in town, as most paramedics needed to work a second job, flexible enough to allow them to run off at a moment’s notice.
In a SOC station, paramedics are scheduled for a certain number of hours per day—say, eight or ten—and for three days. During that time, they are at the station or with the ambulance, always ready to go during the time they are scheduled. During the off hours, they carry the pager and are ready to respond to calls during that time.
Which improved the coverage in town, but, according to Trumbley, that model has proven to be quite limiting in what the paramedics can do.
“It doesn’t align well with the clinic hours at the Diagnostic and Treatment Centre,” she says. “It makes transfers out of the centre difficult, as those typically come as our paramedics are on their pager hours. We have some serious fatigue control rules, and it has caused us a lot of problems.”
This means that the SOC model, is being discontinued after a year and a half. “We’re just starting to work on what will replace it. That is going to include community engagement. So we are going to listen very carefully to what people have to say. Please ask questions. Tell me your stories.”
She says they are also going to be engaging with Northern Health around things like clinic hours and transfers and what’s going to work best for people in town. “Most importantly, we’re going to be engaging with our staff to find out what kind of work they think is going to work best in Tumbler Ridge, because they are living here and working here. And they have the best sense of what you need. We’re going to be working very closely with all the stakeholders as we decide what the best model is for Tumbler Ridge as well as our other scheduled on call communities. So that work is just starting.”
She says they are hoping to have a plan in place by the end of March, 2024. Tumbler Ridge is one of 60 SOC stations across the province.
Manager of Clinical Operations for the Northeast Jonathan Brnjas says that the number one concern from the community is timely service. “If you call 911 Is somebody going to come?”
He says they’re working hard to develop a model that works for the community. “But even currently, we’re doing everything we can to ensure that there’s an ambulance in Tumbler Ridge,” he says. “If it requires bringing in ambulances from other communities, if we have to pay overtime, if we have to do vacation recall…whatever it takes to ensure we have staff working, we’re doing that.”
Still, he admits it’s not perfect. “Is there going to be gaps in coverage? Is there going to be times where you may have to wait? Yes, but that’s going to be because we’re busy and our resources are tied up elsewhere. But for normal day to day operations, were either ensuring your local ambulance is staffed, or we’re bringing in ambulances from outside the community.”
He has nothing but good to say about the commitment of the local team. “The amount of effort that your local paramedics put in day in and day out to ensure that your ambulances running the amount of heart and love they have for this community is evident. I can understand having frustrations with BCEHS as an organization, but your local paramedics are giving 150 percent. They are dealing with limited staffing and they’re working day and night to try and ensure that there is coverage. They are bending over backwards to ensure that your community is staffed. So if you if you see them in the street to thank them. They are working really hard. If you have complaints, that’s what Deb and I, or the website are for. But they are working really hard and it’s very evident that they want to do best for you as members of their community.”
During the question and answer period, one local resident stood up to share her story. Approximately 10 months ago, she says, she had a heart attack. It was nighttime, so her husband called 9-1-1. But instead of an ambulance arriving, it was Dustin Curry and Mike Thibodeau from the Fire Department. And that’s how she got to the clinic.
At the hospital, Doctor Iffy said she would need to get a transfer to Dawson Creek. “But there was no ambulance. My husband said he would put my into the truck and take her. The doctor said ‘no you’re not’, my husband said ‘yes, I am.’ The doctor won out, but we waited four hours for an ambulance to come in. I made it to Dawson stayed there a few hours and then the air flight came in to take me to Kamloops. There was no ambulance available, and when one came in from Dawson to take me out, there would have been no ambulance if somebody else got sick or had a heart attack. The ambulance service that we have here is important, but I will say, I was never so happy to see Dustin and Mike when they came into my living room, and those two never missed a step. I mean, they were just wonderful.”
Dustin Curry says that’s the job of the Fire Department. He says, with the exception of our partners at dispatch, the Fire Department is often the first to arrive in times of need. We are not—with the exception of the two chief officers—we are not paid professionals. We are paid on call firefighters that are giving up their time to respond to you and your emergency.”
He says last year, the Fire Department responded to 197 calls, from car accidents to fires. “About 60% of those calls were medical in nature. We are being called out to assist our partners in one shape or form at all hours, day or night. Doesn’t matter. The Fire Department doesn’t go on diversion. We are always there. It literally doesn’t matter.”
Brnjas says he wants to hear stories like this from the community. “I don’t want to hear that you didn’t get ambulances when you had your heart attack, but this is information that I can use.”
He says he is “very sorry that we weren’t able to be there for you when you needed us, and thank you to our partners in the Fire Department for taking such good care of you.” He hopes the new resources will help alleviate these situations. “We are adding resources to the area, and we are working to make sure that the availability of the local crew is increased.”
Right now, Trumbley says, the shortfall is finding people to work those ambulances. With a new collective agreement, paramedics are now making wages on par with other emergency service workers. “It’s been a huge uplift in their wages, combined with the addition of hundreds of full time jobs. This means BCEHS can now offer a good paying career. We’re offering paid training, full pension benefits, paid vacation paid sick time.”
She says they are actively recruiting, and she expects there will be even more new positions once the new model comes into effect. “We have jobs we have good paying jobs. We are recruiting like crazy. We just put a posting out for 157 full time jobs across the province and we’re anticipating another round of full time postings next year.”
For more information on ambulance services or paramedic careers, visit
www.bcehs.ca
Trent is the publisher of Tumbler RidgeLines.
