I whole heartedly agree with Pilgrim... Private ambulance systems are preventing the progression of EMS as a profession. They keep people overworked, underappreciated and underpaid... People are willing to do it for free, or for peanuts and so places have a constant influx of undereducated, underpaid, and underappreciated workers... "Hey, I can walk off the streets and take a 6 week EMT course and then be on an ambulance?!?! Awesome!!!" This "Lack of educational standards" propogates the problem of having underqualified TECHNICIANS (as opposed to clinicians, which is what we should be)... And you're never going to have adequately educated (*read Bachelor's degree*{which as pointed out earlier is the entry level requirements for most careers, and ALL "professions"}) without paying them more. Privately owned companies are the second most common system model, and you're never going to get a decent amount of pay, when your supervisors main focus being making money!
The majority of EMS (nationwide {next to volunteer}) are being run by Fire Departments... And no offense to you fire medics, but when i call a plumber, i want a plumber to show up... Not an electrician who does plumbing on the side... Whats the problem with this? Its apples and oranges, just because you have trucks placed around the city, and have lights on them, doesnt mean you can do Prehospital Medicine. The other problem is that the majority of your time, effort, and money is spent supporting your primary mission... Fire Suppression...
AS A GENERAL RULE U.S. HEALTHCARE SUCKS! It totally needs overhauled... Its way overpriced, is not nearly as progressive as we think (especially in the prehospital arena), and in some of our major benchmarks, we lag way behind countries like... CUBA?!?!?!?
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2091rank.html
The majority of EMS (nationwide {next to volunteer}) are being run by Fire Departments... And no offense to you fire medics, but when i call a plumber, i want a plumber to show up... Not an electrician who does plumbing on the side... Whats the problem with this? Its apples and oranges, just because you have trucks placed around the city, and have lights on them, doesnt mean you can do Prehospital Medicine. The other problem is that the majority of your time, effort, and money is spent supporting your primary mission... Fire Suppression...
AS A GENERAL RULE U.S. HEALTHCARE SUCKS! It totally needs overhauled... Its way overpriced, is not nearly as progressive as we think (especially in the prehospital arena), and in some of our major benchmarks, we lag way behind countries like... CUBA?!?!?!?
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2091rank.html