Paramedics take help into patients' homes

Shortly after the World Health Organization declared a pandemic in March 2020, Oxford County's paramedics became an essential part of the local COVID-19 response.

Ryan Orton, the superintendent of education for the Oxford County Paramedics Service, helped organize much of it. He and his team, including paramedic chief Ben Addley and deputy chief Ryan Hall, set goals to keep people out of hospitals and provide service where needed.

“We want to serve the community,” Orton said. “We want to say yes. Paramedics are a versatile bunch. We're used to being thrown off and going different directions quickly.”

What sets the Oxford County paramedics apart is their involvement in nearly every facet of pandemic preparedness and response. They created a community testing program and ran a vaccination clinic while keeping up with emergency calls.

They also ran a community paramedicine program to help keep vulnerable palliative and chronically ill patients out of hospitals. Teams of Oxford paramedics visited people in their homes, seeing about 200 patients in 700 visits to date.

“I asked my team, hands went up (and) here we are: a new role, a new program, and they adapt. The things we're doing, I would never have seen coming. Yet here we are.”

Their teams, Addley said, have given about 14,000 COVID-19 tests, distributed 400,000 pieces of personal protective equipment and vaccinated about 700 people, focusing on seniors, housebound individuals and those living with chronic illness.

“We've gone from just you and a partner on an ambulance to being part of an interdisciplinary team with doctors, nurses, managers, agencies,” Orton said. “It's a very different way of medicine for paramedics, but it's also being able to help get patients get what they need, when they need it.”

Oxford County paramedics have been indispensable, and fatigue has been a challenge, but there came a moment that put it all in perspective.

“It was seeing the tears in eyes that first day we started vaccinations. It's hard work and stress and everything that comes with treating patients, all coming towards the moment where there is a way forward now.”

KATHLEEN SAYLORS / POSTMEDIA Ryan Orton says COVID-19 has fundamentally changed paramedics' jobs and expanded their mandate as part of the community's health-care team.