MARROWSTONE ISLAND — East Jefferson Fire Rescue will begin this weekend an experimental pilot program to weigh the impacts of having a volunteer-run Basic Life Support ambulance on Marrowstone Island.
The ambulance and crew will operate from noon to 8 p.m. each weekend in June out of East Jefferson Fire Rescue’s Station 1-2 on Flagler Road in Mystery Bay State Park.
They will provide Basic Life Support (BLS), which is care that first-responders, health care professionals and public safety officials give to people experiencing cardiac arrest, respiratory distress or obstructed airways, EJFR said in a press release.
“In reviewing our calls on the Island, it’s clear a significant number generally occur on the weekends during daylight hours,” the press release said. “We are hoping to validate the assumption where the presence of a volunteer BLS unit on Marrowstone Island reduces response times and has a measurable outcome for the patient on actual 9-1-1 calls.
“Good BLS care can increase survivability until the patient receives more advanced care.”
Currently, response times to Marrowstone are more than 14 minutes from the closest station. EJFR receives about 100 calls per year from the island, the release said.
EJFR has a pool of about 40 volunteers, 20 of whom are emergency medical technicians. Two to three volunteers will be on shift during the weekend pilot program, said Fire Chief Bret Black on Tuesday.
In preparing for this mission, they’ve completed more than 100 hours of specialized training, he said.
“One of the things that has the biggest impacts on someone’s survival of a major medical emergency is the time duration that it takes us to get to the emergency,” Black said. “The shorter the increment of time, the better the chances of survival for you when we get there.
“We’re hoping to see a significant reduction in (response time) with the volunteer presence staffing the ambulance so we can initiate care sooner.”
After June, the department will analyze the data from the calls — if any — that the volunteer ambulance crew responded to and determine if it makes sense to expand service there. Now, the site has only two storage buildings for spare vehicles and no facilities for crew members, Black said.
EJFR and the Marrowstone Island Foundation (MIF) are working together in a public/private partnership to fund the construction of a modest volunteer fire department crew facility at Station 1-2 while simultaneously working on the pilot program, with more information to be released after the pilot is completed.
“I’m excited to prove the residents of Marrowstone that we’re able to support this program if we can get consistent support from our volunteers and our volunteers are up to the job,” Black said.
“Going forward, I hope it’s a call to action to the community at large: we need more volunteers so that we can bring these response times down and increase the survivability of anybody when they have an emergency on Marrowstone Island.”
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Jefferson County reporter Zach Jablonski can be reached at 360-385-2335, ext. 5, or at zjablonski@peninsuladailynews.com.
