Oswego, NY -- The city of Oswego faces a $10,000 fine now that the investigation of the Oswego Fire Department’s ambulance squad is complete. Fire Chief Jeff McCrobie said late Wednesday that the state Department of Health’s Bureau of Emergency Medical Services found 38 emergency medical service personnel failed to complete pre-hospital care reports on 178 occasions. Also, the state...
Oswego, NY -- The city of Oswego faces a $10,000 fine now that the investigation of the Oswego Fire Department’s ambulance squad is complete.
Fire Chief Jeff McCrobie said late Wednesday that the state Department of Health’s Bureau of Emergency Medical Services found 38 emergency medical service personnel failed to complete pre-hospital care reports on 178 occasions.
Also, the state found the fire department failed to maintain a treatment management record for patients who received advanced life support services on numerous occasions.
“These issues, as serious as they are, involve paperwork only and patient care was never compromised,” McCrobie said. “Most involved ‘canceled enroute’ calls, where the crews were canceled and never made it to the destination and returned to quarters.”
The pre-hospital care reports are mandated by state Department of Health policy. They document all care given to a patient once an emergency crew arrives until the person is put into the care of the hospital emergency room.
But, the policy states even if an ambulance squad call is canceled, a report still must be made.
“That’s the issue,” McCrobie said, noting it wasn’t being done by Oswego personnel. He said there is a place at the bottom of the report that the ambulance personnel can check that states their call was canceled before reaching the patient.
The treatment management record is a record of all treatment a patient receives.
“We got a little lax in doing our paperwork, McCrobie said. “We all learned something from this.”
Just last month, 39 emergency services workers with the Oswego Fire Department’s ambulance squad were issued warning letters concerning conduct dealing with transportation and filing reports, said Jeffrey Hammond, speaking for the health department.
McCrobie said the department has acknowledged the report and a settlement was reached pending approval by the Oswego Common Council at its Sept. 13 meeting. The settlement includes the $10,000 fine — $2,000 must of paid within 30 days of the date of the order from the state. The other $8,000 will be suspended if the fire department does not violate the public health law or state emergency medical services code within two years of the date of the order.
McCrobie said the fire department has instituted new policies and procedures since January to ensure all paperwork is done for every call.
“The state has acknowledged and commended our efforts in remedying these violations. There are (corrective) measures we have made as a group and we know what we have to do,” McCrobie said.
The health department began its investigation in January. Hammond said at that time it had received four complaints stemming from one incident concerning failure to transport a person to the hospital when called.
McCrobie said the fire department cooperated fully with the investigation.