Community paramedicine began over 50 years ago in other developed nations where paramedics provided medical services and support to their communities within the patient’s residence without transport to a physician’s office or to a healthcare facility. Gary Wingrove, a paramedic at the Mayo Clinic Ambulance Service, launched the first formal community paramedicine program in the United States in 2001.
Since that time, community paramedicine has become a critical element of mobile integrated healthcare. As defined by the Commission on the Accreditation of Medical Transport Systems (CAMTS), mobile integrated healthcare is a coordinated, patient-centered, evidence-based, holistic model of care using collaborative, interdisciplinary teams to serve patient needs at the most appropriate level of care at a safe out-of-hospital location.
Active and engaged EMS medical direction is essential in the foundation of any mobile integrated healthcare system, regardless of whether it is based in a metropolitan, suburban, or rural region. This workshop is a cost-effective avenue for Ohio’s EMS medical directors, EMS agencies, and other partners and stakeholders to acquire the knowledge to create a sustainable and fiscally sound mobile integrated healthcare network and/or to enhance and empower their system that already exists.