Paramedic Plan Imperils Patients, Group Warns

A citizens group has expanded its campaign against a controversial plan to reorganize paramedic services, raising money for a mailer that suggests the San Fernando Valley would suffer.

The plan, drawn up by the Los Angeles Fire Department and endorsed by county health officials, would put one paramedic and one emergency medical technician in each ambulance, instead of two paramedics. The second paramedic would ride a fire engine.

The Fire Department says the plan will offset a shortage of paramedics and shorten response times because paramedics in either fire engines or ambulances would be able to respond to emergencies.

But several homeowner groups were not impressed.

“It makes no sense,” said Harold Tennen, vice president of the Glenridge Homeowners Assn. near Beverly Glen Boulevard and Mulholland Drive. “I’ve spoken to hundreds of paramedics. The chief wants to save a minute. You can’t count on that for a minute.”

Tennen heads the Citizens Committee to Stop the Chief’s 1 + 1 Plan. The committee claims citywide membership of homeowner associations from Benedict Canyon, Sherman Oaks, Benedict Hills, Glenridge and Beverly Glen, which pooled $25,000 to oppose the plan.

The first set of fliers will be sent out early next week to about 8,000 residents in those groups. One is headlined “Don’t Have a Heart Attack in the Valley.”

“Splitting up paramedics creates the illusion of more paramedic resources,” the flier states. “More ambulances with paramedics are needed!”

Los Angeles Fire Battalion Chief Daryl Arbuthnott said there is no quick solution to the department’s paramedic shortage, and the pilot project is needed.

“It won’t impact the public as it is being portrayed,” he said. “It’s more of an internal problem about getting staffing up.”

The department is struggling with 51 paramedic vacancies, resulting in grueling overtime shifts. Last year, 22 firefighters decided to stop working as paramedics, said Capt. Robert Linnell, president of the Los Angeles Paramedic Assn.

“That shows a crisis. Something is wrong,” he said. “Firefighters don’t want to be paramedics anymore.”

The Los Angeles Paramedic Assn. and rank-and-file paramedics have decried the plan since it was proposed last year because, they said, it will dilute emergency medical care. Paramedics undergo more than 1,000 hours of medical training and can provide advance life support, administer intravenous medication and other procedures. Emergency medical technicians receive about 100 hours of training and can provide basic first aid, cardiopulmonary resuscitation and defibrillation.

Arbuthnott said the county Department of Health Services has blessed the proposal and will monitor its progress or problems. The concept has worked well at other departments, he said.

If the pilot Valley project is successful, the Fire Department said, it will consider expanding the system citywide.

The program originally was scheduled to begin this month in the Valley, but Chief William Bamattre postponed it until the end of September because of the need for beefed-up staffing for next month’s Democratic National Convention.

But others think the paramedic shortage is a factor in that decision.

“It’s not just the DNC,” Linnell said. “We need 177 paramedic positions to do one-plus-one for the Valley. We’re short 25. Now they’re caught.”