Panel Agrees to Recommend 2 Paramedics for Ambulances : Health: The requirement, limited to densely populated areas, will be considered for adoption by the county’s Emergency Medical Care Committee.

A panel of Ventura County doctors and emergency service providers voted Thursday to recommend that ambulance operators be required to put two paramedics on each unit in heavily populated areas.

The panel voted 18-3 to recommend approval of the new requirement to the county’s Emergency Medical Care Committee. The committee advises the Board of Supervisors on emergency service issues and is responsible for developing operating guidelines for the three ambulance companies that serve the region.

Those who voted Thursday included doctors from the county’s 13 hospitals as well as representatives from the county Fire Department, the Sheriff’s Department and the three ambulance operators.

Officials of Pruner Ambulance, the county’s largest ambulance operator and the only one that would be directly affected by the panel’s recommendations, said they do not agree that two paramedics are warranted in every situation.

Pruner chief administrator Steve Murphy said the company conducted a study last year in Camarillo comparing the level of service provided by an ambulance team consisting of one paramedic and one emergency medical technician and another with two paramedics.

“We did not find any significant difference in care,” he said.

Emergency medical technicians can administer basic life support, such as supplying oxygen or performing CPR. Paramedics, on the other hand, can dispense medication, administer intravenous fluids and work under the supervision of doctors.

Murphy said Pruner employs 33 paramedics and about 40 emergency medical technicians to staff 12 ambulances at seven stations across the county. He said some ambulances serving Camarillo, Ventura, Santa Paula, Fillmore and Moorpark include either one paramedic and one emergency technician or two technicians. Ambulances serving Thousand Oaks and Simi Valley usually include two paramedics.

Murphy questioned whether it would be “financially doable” for Pruner to always provide two paramedics in densely populated areas, but said it was too early to comment on what Pruner will do if the recommendations are approved.

Phillip K. Wessels, director of the Ventura County Health Care Agency, said it will be up to the Emergency Medical Care Committee to define what areas in the county would need to be served by ambulances with two paramedics. Wessels noted that some members of the panel that voted Thursday also sit on the committee, which usually follows the panel’s recommendations.

Although the committee is scheduled to take up the issue at its April 15 meeting, Wessels said it may be longer before the matter is settled.

Wessels said the paramedic study conducted by Pruner was inadequate because it focused only on Camarillo, which is significantly smaller than some of Pruner’s service areas. He said it was “very dangerous” to make systemwide changes based on such a limited study.

Wessels said that under their current contracts with the county, the three ambulance companies are only required to provide basic life-support services. But because all three choose to provide paramedic service, which allows them to charge more for services, they must follow county guidelines, he said.

Meanwhile, officials of Gold Coast Ambulance Service--which serves Oxnard and areas in and around Port Hueneme--and Ojai Ambulance Service said they would not be affected if the new staffing requirements are adopted, because they already provide two paramedics in most of their ambulances. In addition, the Ojai company might be excluded from the requirements because of the small population it serves, officials said.

Ken Maffei, president of the Ventura County Firefighters Assn., which has been pushing for a firefighter paramedic program, said he was pleased that the panel “didn’t sell out to the ambulance companies.”