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EMS mulls ambulance upcharge for heavy patients
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| By Ryan D. Wilson, Staff Reporter |
November 03, 2009 |
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Clay County Emergency Management Director Pam Kemp said Monday her department is not yet at the point of charging double for morbidly obese patients, but it may eventually come to that.
"I'm not ready to come to you and tell you we need to charge double (for obese patients)," Kemp told County Commissioners Monday.
The question of whether Emergency Management should charge obese patients an extra fee for ambulance service rose when Kemp reported a service out of Topeka charges "almost double" for obese patients. Clay County hasn't decided how much extra it should charge, nor at what weight they should start charging the extra fee.
Certainly the department should charge an extra fee, Kemp said, because handling obese patients requires additional and specialized equipment that are "significant investments," and handling obese patients is becoming more common.
The department uses cots rated up to 500 lbs and has a few rated for up to 750 lbs. Patients who've used the ones for up to 750 lbs "stretch every bit" of the metal in those cots, Kemp said.
Heavier patients should be moved with a specially-equipped ambulance with a lift capable of picking them up and more space to house them. As it is now, paramedics have to strip ambulances bare and have the obese patients lie on the floor, and have had to call in a forklift to lift some patients, Kemp said.
Commissioners asked if the special ambulance would be demeaning, since the patients aren't lifted by paramedics, the specially-equipped ambulance isn't any more demeaning than having to be lifted by a forklift, Kemp said.
Commissioner Jerry Mayo asked whether some patients might be offended by the extra charge, depending on at what weight they start charging extra. People that heavy, whether they are 500 or 800 lbs, know they are obese, Kemp said.
In other county news:
-- Zoning Administrator Steve McAnally recommended to change the zoning on a parcel of land in the southeast one-fourth of 02-08-02 from agriculture to commercial. Commissioners approved the zoning request for Reed Seed Sales on the parcel.
-- The zoning board will meet 7 a.m. Nov. 24 for a hearing for an animal use permit on Lori Nuemayer's property on West Blunt St.
-- Governor Parkinson confirmed in a letter Kemp's reappointment to the Advisory Committee on Trauma for four years effective Oct. 24.
-- Commissioners granted permission to apply for a grant that will soon be available to help with the purchase of an ambulance and to purchase all-weather coats for three new EMS employees at about $130 each.
-- Commissioners reappointed Arlene Reed to serve another two-year term on the North Central-Flint Hills Area Agency of Aging Board of Directors. Reed has already served two previous terms.
-- Highway Administrator Steve Liby reported blacktopping a half of a mile with a 6-inch layer on Limestone Road off of 18th Road will take an estimated 3,500 ton of asphalt. The cost of the asphalt is unknown until it is time to start the job.
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©Clay Center Dispatch 2009
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