BY DAN HILDEBRAN
Union County Commissioners approved a new fee schedule that the county will start charging healthcare facilities whenever emergency medical crews stay more than 20 minutes at a hospital after delivering a patient.
Fire and Emergency Medical Services Director Brent Allen said hospitals are holding up his crews and those from other counties when delivering patients.
“What’s supposed to happen is the hospital automatically accepts that patient,” he told commissioners. “That’s part of (the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act). If they don’t have a room to put that patient in, they leave the patient on our stretcher and ask us to stay with them. We are going to do what’s best for the patient. We’re going to stay with them. But at the same time, we are paying that truck and those clinicians to be responding to calls in Union County.”
Allen said his department is not the only one facing increasing wait times at hospitals.
“It has become a problem,” he told commissioners. “A lot of counties are facing it. I’ve talked to other chiefs, and some of the ways that we’re addressing that is they’re addressing this by charging the hospitals for their crews being there.”
Allen added that not all hospitals are holding up his crews.
According to the fee schedule, the county will bill a hospital $287 after a crew has been at the facility for 20 minutes. The fee increases by $108 for each additional 15 minutes, with a base rate reassessment every hour. If a crew was detained at a hospital for two hours and five minutes, the total charge would be $1,617.
Allen said that according to other area fire chiefs, hospitals are paying the invoices sent to them by other jurisdictions.
“Hospitals are paying this right now,” he said. “They don’t see it as a problem. Our goal is that it does become a financial problem for them, and we get our resources back, and they address the problem on their end.”
“We want our guys back,” he added. “That is what we want. The only way we’re going to get that is if we start charging them for it.”
Allen told commissioners that when analyzing last year’s calls, he found 188 cases of ambulances spending more than 20 minutes at hospitals. He stated that if the fee schedule had been in place last year, the county would have billed healthcare facilities nearly $75,000.
He emphasized that the hospital fee is a temporary measure that should not be relied upon for county revenue growth.
“We’re not looking to make money off of this,” added Board Chair Channing Dobbs. “We’re looking to get our ambulances back in the county to serve our citizens.”
