BY TRACY LEE TATE
Times Editor
Union County Emergency Medical Services has a new medical director who brings to the table extensive experience in emergency medicine and acting as a medical director for a department.
Dr. Robert Spindell comes from Maine, originally. He holds degrees from Julian University in New Orleans and Kirksville College of Osteopathic Medicine in Kirksville, MO. He specialized in family medicine, doing both his internship and residency in Portland, ME.
Spindell moved to Florida in 1989 to work under the National Health Service Corp., a Federal agency, providing staffing in a program mandated to provide health manpower in areas where there were shortages. He filled this role as a Board Certified Family Medicine physician.
In 1990, Spindell began working in the emergency rooms in Madison and Suwannee counties, as well as in the Army Reserve, where, where he worked in Emergency Medicine in Operation Desert Storm and Fort Benning, GA. After this first foray into emergency medicine, Spindell advanced to become more specialized in emergency medicine. He became the full-time director of Suwannee Hospital, which became Shands Live Oak about the same time as the hospital in Starke became Shands Starke.
“I like emergency medicine,” Spindell said. “It is a lot more dynamic and non-routine and I am grateful to be helping people that really need the treatment and attention.”
Spindell soon started serving as the EMS Director in several counties, including Madison, Lafayette, Suwannee, Hamilton, Jefferson and Baker, making him well-versed in running the technical end of departments in small, sometimes economically challenged counties.
Now he has added Union to the list and to the consortium and a coalition which he helped to form, that include all of the counties he serves – the North Florida EMS Advisory Council and the North Florida Coalition (a program for Emergency Medical Technicians (EMTs) and Paramedics, both of which meet quarterly.
Through his various emergency medical experience he became a friend and colleague of Dr. Pete Gianas, previous director of both Bradford and Union County Emergency Medical Services, who passed away last year. After his death Union hired another medical director, but the match did not work out for the county so, at the recommendation of UCEMS Director Toby Witt, the board hired Spindell in March.
With the addition of Union, Spindell is now the medical director of seven counties and also serves as the Emergency Services Training Medical Director at North Florida College in Madison.
Spindell said he is well pleased with the Union EMS. He said he has worked with Witt before and is impressed with his knowledge and abilities.
Of Witt, Spindell said, “ Toby will serve the county well. He is an administrator of great capacity and is well versed in clinical medicine. I am always impressed with his work. He is a good medic and I can honestly say that I don’t have as much confidence in many others as I do in him.”
He said he found the department to be well staffed with “as good as can be had,” and said he could see Gianas’ influence in the progressive protocols and standards the department operates under, although he said that in such a fact changing field “there is always room for improvement.”
Spindell’s duties will include upholding and maintaining both the highest standards and current protocols in emergency medicine (which he says is his biggest role), quality assurance measures, including new and better techniques and equipment. He will also review records of calls for service and will often take them to coalition meetings (patient name kept anonymous) for peer review.
“Reviews by peers serve a dual purpose,” Spindell said. “Sometimes a call from another department will present a new situation to staff from other departments and other times will deal with a commonly encountered situation that the review can derive the best way to deal with matters.”
Spindell will also work with groups in the department, or sometimes one-on-one with a medic, as much as is practical to make sure all are trained in, and aware, of best practices in situations. He is also in charge for making it possible (under his medical license) for the department to obtain the medications, drugs and supplies needed for the trucks and reviewing controversial cases, if any, offering an unbiased opinion and assuring quality in the service provided. He will also occasionally conduct other training with new hires and provide code training to training officers and will work medics from several counties for check-offs on skills.
“It is a pleasure and an honor to be given the opportunity to serve Union County and a challenge to try and fill the place of Pete Gianis,” Spindell said. “I will do my best here, but I am not sure if I will ever reach his level in this position. He was one of a kind.”
