Whats your take ???

[sabbymedic]

I agree people should be educated. But I do not agree that in an area which doesn't have alternative sources of help like yours, leaving somebody on the doorstep without other options is not right either.

In the area I referred to in my personal experience, the only other possible way to get to the charity hospital was a cab ride. There were no vouchers or programs to pay. So even after you educated them, you might have left a person needing care but not an ALS ambulance standing in the driveway.

The protocols for refusal were also so poorly written and the process so cumbersome, it had little benefit. Especially after some caught on to the magic words "chest pain." rather than being revised the protocol was scrapped, which was not the right decision either. But the medical direction (a panel of doctors who had to approve protocol that one signed off on) was not amiable to revision.

With the environment you describe yours as, refusal of transport is a viable and worthy option.

I think this is a good point. Where I work unfortunatly we do not have the ability to tell people that they do not need an ambulance. As a medic we can suggest to them that they do not have an emergency needing an ambulance and perhaps they could check with the family doctor or even a walk in clinic. The end result being that if they still choose to use our services then they get them. In Ontario the majority of the ambulance ride is paid for, the only thing that the people get charged is $45.

We do have a section on our forms to have the doctor sign off on under unnecessary use of an ambulance but good luck getting a doc to sign off on it. Since 1992 which is when I started working I have only had one doctor sign it off.

Unfortunately Law Suites cost money and money drives the direction of our business due to liability issues.