Reduction of the call-response interval with ambulance base paging

To determine whether the call-response interval for an emergency medical services (EMS) system would be decreased through the introduction of ambulance base paging.

The study community included a mixture of urban and rural areas with a total population of approximately 400,000. The EMS system is composed of two ambulance services and one central ambulance communication center with computer-aided dispatching capabilities. Approximately 30,000 calls are responded to yearly by the combined ambulance services. A before-and-after study design was used. In a retrospective review of one ambulance service, there were 224 calls collected in the period before base paging and 200 calls collected in the period after base paging was introduced. In the other ambulance service, there were 571 calls captured in the period before base paging and 515 calls captured in the period after base paging.

The call-receipt-to-crew-notified interval was reduced from the before period to the after period in both ambulance services: Cambridge--61.8 to 49.8 seconds (p < 0.0001); Kitchener--66.6 to 46.2 seconds (p < 0.0001). The crew-notified-to-vehicle-mobile interval was reduced from the before period to the after period in both ambulance services: Cambridge--91.8 to 73.2 seconds (p < 0.0001); Kitchener-80.4 to 66.0 seconds (p < 0.0001).

The introduction of ambulance base paging reduced components of the call-response interval in this EMS system. Overall, the reduction in time was approximately 30 seconds, which was found to be statistically significant.