Ambulance relocation concerns Highlanders

After the opening of Fire Station 4 alongside Forrest Hills Boulevard, the ambulance that had been in place at Station 3 was moved to Station 4, leaving Station 3 with a fire truck — and some residents in its service area with concerns that they may not be getting the sort of emergency care they need.

The emergency response plan, according to a letter released by the city, is to have the fire truck from Station 3 respond to any calls — be they fire or medical — in that area, to be followed by the ambulance from Station 4 in case a patient needs to be transported.

The firefighters who are on this truck, like all firefighters on the Bella Vista Fire Department, are also emergency medical technicians, and the truck is equipped with medical gear, ensuring they can provide initial care. Once the ambulance arrives, according to the letter, the truck can return to Station 3 and be ready for another call.

Station 3 is on Glasgow Road,

near the Branchwood Clubhouse.

Station 4 is a quarter-mile north of the Highlands Gate on Arkansas Highway 279.

Michelle Gilbert, a resident of the northwestern part of Bella Vista — which is Station 3’s service area — said she finds this troubling.

“I have a problem believing that moving our ambulance further out will give us better care,” she said. “It doesn’t make sense that they think we get help faster without an ambulance out here.”

Gilbert said she found out about this while talking with a friend, Pat Haas.

“I would never even have known we didn’t have an ambulance until I had a need for it,” Haas said.

Haas said she had fainted and needed help to get up, and that, because the ambulance came from Station 4, she was on the floor far longer than she should have been. This happened twice, she said.

She wanted to be clear, she said, that she isn’t attacking the Fire Department.

“None of this has to do with EMTs,” Haas said. “They do a good job.”

Her concern, she said, is that she didn’t see any publicity or public input. If there was more opportunity for public comment,

or more awareness, she said, it might have been easier for residents to understand what’s happening, or for the city to reach a compromise. But after discussing this with her neighbors, she said, it seemed like everyone she knew was wholly unaware.

She doesn’t want to simply complain, she said. She wants to find a solution.

“If this was going to be such a needed thing,” she said, “the community at large should have been covered.”

Fire Chief Steve Sims said he has been discussing this exact setup for two years now.

“We moved that ambulance to an area that has a higher call volume,” he said. “It’s still handling the calls out there, we just moved it.”

This move, he said, allows the department to keep continuous fire and emergency medical coverage on the west side of the lake.

Prior to this, Sims said, Station 3 had an ambulance and firetruck, as well as the exact two firefighters it’s capable of housing. This meant that if one vehicle was deployed, the other was sitting there.

Furthermore, he said, if Station 3’s ambulance had to transport anyone, the area could be completely uncovered for as long as two hours, during which responses would have to come from Station 1 at Town Center, taking roughly 20 minutes.

With this configuration, he said, the fire truck can respond to medical calls. The truck is equipped with all of the basic life support equipment that the cross-trained firefighter/EMTs could need, allowing them to save lives and get patients ready for transport, if needed. And if it is, the ambulance from Station 4 will be only minutes behind it, ensuring the patient can be transported.

“That’s the way we feel is to provide the best coverage for that area.”

In the case of Haas’ call, he said, there was an error on the dispatch side of things. This was a very new program, he said, and it didn’t go to plan immediately.

“When Pat called 911,” he said, “for whatever reason dispatch did not dispatch the truck. I can understand her frustration.”

Sims said he spoke with Police Chief Ken Farmer about this, and steps have been taken to ensure there are no future mistakes like this — and at the moment, it’s working well.

He said that, if the numbers start to suggest an ambulance will be needed for Station 3’s area, he’s certainly open to the possibility. But with the current call volume, he said, this is the best approach.

“The data is being collected every day,” he said. “We will continue to do that . ... I know exactly how many calls that ambulance makes over there.”