Re: Northbrook Ambulance Service to be reduced

Bill Snider | Feb 03, 2016

For the past 4 years Northbrook ambulance service received back up assistance during its day shift from the Denbigh ambulance service. Denbigh ambulance was moved to Northbrook base when Northbrook was on a call. That is, Northbrook was receiving ambulance service from 2 ambulances.

This will no longer happen if recommendations presented to L & A County Council on January 11, 2016 by L & A Chief of Emergency Services, Mark Schjerning, are put into operation (L&A County staff call for closure of Denbigh ambulance service, Jan 14/16). The 12/7 daytime service at Denbigh will no longer exist. The Denbigh ambulance will be transferred to Loyalist service to make Loyalist a 24/7 full time service.

This means that Northbrook service will have one ambulance 24/7 with no back up. It also means that Northbrook ambulance service will need to do an additional 190 daytime calls that the previous Denbigh service did each year. That involves 1/2 hour to get to Denbigh, plus 1/2 hour to return to Northbrook, plus the time required to complete each call by going to a hospital in Renfrew, Bancroft or sometimes Napanee. A call where the patient is taken to Renfrew would likely involve the Northbrook ambulance being away from Northbrook for 3 - 4 hours.

Under this proposed arrangement the closest ambulance service in L & A County to Northbrook service will be Napanee ambulance service. A second call for ambulance service in Northbrook's service area would need to be done by Napanee ambulance service. For the patient involved that means 35 - 45 minutes wait for the ambulance to come from Napanee to Northbrook and another 35 - 45 minutes to return to Napanee hospital. A call from areas beyond Northbrook would increase the response time and combined return time to Napanee hospital by 2 minutes for every mile beyond Northbrook.

Calls from or beyond Vennachar Junction on #41 highway would in all probability require that the patient be taken to Renfrew hospital or Bancroft hospital if the patient's condition or injuries were life threatening. Ambulance dispatchers are required by regulations to have the patient delivered to the closest hospital in life-threatening situations. For an ambulance from Napanee to deliver a patient to Renfrew and return to Napanee would require 4 - 5 hours.

This information is presented to show some of the ramifications of Chief Schjerning's recommendations. Our L&A County Council needs your input by whatever form best suits your situation. Addington Highlands' Reeve Henry Hogg and Deputy Reeve Helen Yanch need your support to help them resolve this issue.