Why AMR should walk away from Sin City Last week, AMR surrendered to LVFD and the old (and wasteful) dual-response system died. The Fire Department will now be transporting the majority of the patients from the city of Las Vegas, and probably the vast majority of paying patients. AMR is essentially going to be handed table scraps at best to fill the holes left by Fire EMS coverage, and the bloated, obese LVFD isnt going to let many scraps fall through. Adding insult to injury, they even expect AMR to remain viable through transfers, but simultaneously opened their city to competition from Community Ambulance. Now, Fires operation and decisions are their own, with their own pros and cons. Budgets and demands for EMS are going to expand as the taxpaying population shrinks and ages, and the looming water crisis and economic threats from out-of-state competitors in gaming and entertainment are going to make LVFD increasingly insolvent, but thats not AMRs problem. LVFD and the Las Vegas city leaders have decided that private enterprise is not adequate to serve their city and see AMR (and non-Fire EMS) as a necessary evil to be used and abused as they see fit both now and in the future. What should AMR do? Well, right now, it seems theyre rolling over and taking the poop sandwich Las Vegas Fire is force-feeding them with the goal of preserving some profit and keeping the rest of the county in good graces so MedicWest can continue to thrive. Maybe theyre playing the very long game and waiting for Fire to fail, but thats a long ways off and isnt guaranteed. A better option would be to simply abandon City of Las Vegas 911 entirely and refuse to provide mutual aid absent massive payments by Fire. Sure, it would inconvenience patients, possibly kill a few people and make Vegas Fire far busier, less safe and less solvent than it is now, but it also sets a precedent: work with AMR on mutually-beneficial terms or theyll walk. Transfer the employees to MedicWest or other AMR operations, pay for their moves, and leave Community or someone to fill the stinking void of failure that Las Vegas 911 will become. Sure, theyll lose a little money locally, but theyll have drawn a line in the sand and that will probably help keep other markets from trying to copy Vegas. Thats my two cents, and just once, Id like to see AMR stand up for itself. RM reviewjournal/columns-blogs/glenn-cook/city-amr-shut-and-drive
Posted on: Tue, 09 Sep 2014 20:47:23 +0000