Shared Health funding will get Brandon's 3rd ambulance on the road

Brandon's fire chief hopes $2.2 million in funding from Shared Health will reduce ER and ambulance wait times for Southwestern Manitoba's biggest city and the rural communities surrounding it.

Chief Terry Parlow is aiming to get Brandon's third ambulance staffed and on the road by early 2024. The $2.2 million will be used to hire 15 new staff members, including 10 staff for ambulances and five paramedics for the Brandon Police Detention Centre.

"Today's announcement will remove the strain we are all feeling rurally and in the City of Brandon," Parlow said. "Funding for paramedics for a third ambulance in Brandon will ensure that the residents of Brandon when they call 911 for medical care … one will be available."

Parlow says has seen firsthand the fatigue firefighter paramedics face daily responding to a large amount of calls with a limited amount of ambulances. Shared Health provided an ambulance to the city — but staff was needed to run it.

Four staff have been hired using the funds and they are looking to fill the other positions as soon as possible, he says. The funding will also help pay for training paramedics working at the police detention centre, purchasing new equipment and ongoing costs.

Mayor Jeff Fawcett says the funding is a way to address a "big regional issue" when it comes to ambulance and paramedic coverage. It also frees up police because they won't be sitting in the ER if someone detained needs care.

Fawcett said another ambulance may be needed soon, as the six current ambulances — three on-call in Brandon, two for inter-hospital transfers and a spare — might not be enough for the growing city.

He called the funding a regional step forward and part of a continued push for Brandon to enhance residents' needs.

"Our regional services have been a great help to us as we've tried to help them," Fawcett said. "This is great for our region … this is a fairly significant game changer on their operations."

Parlow said Brandon has had two ambulances for 30 or 40 years. 

Staff receive a high number of calls with limited resources leading to burn out, he says. A third ambulance will spread the workload over more people, which will make it easier to manage burnout. 

The funding will also ensure that rural ambulances won't need to respond in Brandon as often, Parlow said. This means rural ambulances will stay in their communities where they are needed most. 

"Success for this program … would mean that police officers aren't in the hospital and also the hundreds of times that the rural ambulance has come into Brandon are no longer occurring," Parlow said. "Those would be easily attainable benchmarks … with the third ambulance in play."

Brandon acting police chief Randy Lewis says staff hired for the detention centre will work there in the hopes of freeing up police for their regular duties. 

Police services have been impacted since April 2020 due to COVID-19. The police process for lodging prisoners changed and they could no longer take them to the Brandon Correctional Centre to lodge them — they had to bring them to the Brandon Police Service instead.

"[This] put a big extra demand on our members and our operation," Lewis said. "Since that time, our members have literally spent thousands of hours in the Brandon Regional Health Centre emergency department with intoxicated prisoners."

In these cases, officers would wait for a person to be cleared medically before being lodged in the Brandon detention units.

Having paramedics working in the detention unit will put officers back on the street where they belong because they can access and care for anyone detained, Lewis said. 

"Going forward …we're excited to see the change."