White County EMS Department is asking the commission to consider including an additional team for night calls in the near future as budget decisions are being made.
EMS Director Mike Kerr said the department currently runs three teams during the day and two at night. He said increased call volumes have put a strain on employees who have to work night shifts and then come in to work shifts right after.
“Any time that we send a night truck out of town at night we have to call in another crew to cover it,” Kerr said. “So that’s getting to where it’s all the time. The crews are spending a lot of time at base which accrues a lot of overtime, it makes them very tired because they have to work both day and night. So that third night truck would alleviate that call in.”
Kerr said running a third truck for night calls would take an additional four employees. He said that could cost the county an estimated $220,000.
Kerr said this would be something nice to have in the coming fiscal year, but just wanted to make commissioners aware of the EMS department’s needs. He said the county has grown from 130 night calls in 2007 to more than 800 night calls last year.
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