Paramedic Plan Draws Fire.The L.A. Fire Department is preparing to test a controversial paramedic par·a·med·ic n. A person who is trained to give emergency medical treatment or assist medical professionals. paramedic deployment plan in the San Fernando Valley San Fernando Valley Valley, southern California, U.S. Northwest of central Los Angeles, the valley is bounded by the San Gabriel, Santa Susana, and Santa Monica mountains and the Simi Hills. that critics say will compromise emergency care. Fire Chief William Bamattre wants to staff ambulances with one licensed paramedic and one emergency medical technician e·mer·gen·cy medical technician n. Abbr. EMT A person trained and certified to appraise and initiate the administration of emergency care for victims of trauma or acute illness before or during transportation of victims to a health care . Such technicians receive one-tenth the training of a paramedic. The plan is designed to help alleviate a shortage of paramedics assigned to ambulance duty and reduce average response time. But the move is opposed by the firefighters union and many emergency care experts, who say the new deployment plan will hurt emergency services emergency services Emergency care '…services …necessary to prevent death or serious impairment of health and, because of the danger to life or health, require the use of the most accessible hospital available and equipped to furnish those services' by doing away with the all-important "second pair of eyes" that is critical in the first minutes of emergency treatment. |
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