Case Study

MedServ Management Services
Client: Heartland Paramedics, St. Joseph, Mo.


Heartland team members build strong ties to the community through public-education events, such as this ambulance tour at a local Heart Walk.

 

“Our investment in MedServ has paid off in helping us deliver top-notch service to the community. ”

- Robert Permut, MD
Chief Medical Officer, Heartland Health

Background
Heartland Paramedics, based in St. Joseph, Mo., is operated for the benefit of the community by Heartland Health, the community’s not-for-profit hospital. The Heartland service has been the only ambulance service in St. Joseph since 1972, when the city asked the hospital to assume this responsibility.

Heartland Paramedics provides Advanced Life Support ambulance service to St. Joseph, most of Buchanan County and other surrounding communities in Missouri and Kansas, with a population base close to 100,000 without public subsidy.

The Challenge
The ambulance service recently came under public scrutiny for long response times to the scenes of emergencies. Additionally, expenses were disproportionately exceeding revenues. With the charge of wanting to “do the right thing,” Heartland retained Fitch & Associates to examine both operational and financial components of the EMS system, identify internal issues and make recommendations for a future system design and concept options.

The Solution
After performing a full system review, the consulting team submitted 59 recommendations to strengthen the system, along with five future design concept options. Heartland executives selected a design concept that introduced enhancements to the current system while maintaining a Basic Life Support first response component, but in the process, they realized that they lacked the necessary leadership to implement the recommendations. MedServ was contracted to provide a full-time, on-site service director to implement the enhancements while managing day-to-day operations.

The Results
At the end of the two-year relationship, 50 of the 59 recommendations had been implemented. Among them:

  • A medical director who is engaged in clinical quality care
  • A 25 percent increase in the workforce, resulting in a significantly increased number of ambulance hours on the streets and improved response times.
  • An enhanced fleet management plan, replacing aging vehicles and increasing the number of available ambulances
  • Establishment of an oversight board made up of stakeholders from the fire department and the community, which now rates the service’s progress a unanimous “5” on a scale of 1 to 5
  • Implementation of a fiscal policy that ensures both transparency and accountability
  • Response-time compliance that meets 90th percentile targeted goals every month
  • Public perception of Heartland Paramedics by both community officials as well as the general public now ranks high
  • In October 2007, Heartland senior leadership extended the management contract with MedServ. Management priorities include continued fine-tuning of response times, expanding and overseeing existing EMT and EMT-P training programs and managing the hospital’s total fleet maintenance program.

“Fitch and Associates completed an objective review of the system and our subsequent partnernership with MedServ provided the expertise we needed to rapidly implement the changes,” said Robert Permut, MD, Chief Medical Officer at Heartland Health. “Our investment in MedServ has paid off in helping us deliver top-notch service to the community.”