The Park Slope Volunteer Ambulance Corps was founded by members of the Park Slope, Brooklyn community in 1992.  At the time, New York City’s Emergency Medical Services were significantly overburdened.  The number of calls for help challenged available resources.  Ambulance response times were often extended over ten minutes. In the case of critical calls, a delay of several minutes can mean the difference between life and death. Calls that are less severe in nature can rapidly deteriorate into critical calls.  As a result, members of Park Slope and the surrounding communities came together and created the Park Slope Volunteer Ambulance Corps.

PSVAC has dutifully served the community for over 15 years, winning many recognitions, awards and sponsorships along the way.  Its membership and dedicated service has become integral to the Park Slope community. 

Today, the Park Slope Volunteer Ambulance Corps has over 30 active members , including  15 crew chiefs.  We have two state-of-the-art ambulances, patrol bicycles and a first-response fly car.  PSVAC responds to thousands of calls every year, resulting in treating and/or transporting over seven hundred patients.  In comparison, there are entire communities around the country whose annual response is less than 500 calls.  PSVAC’s initial projections at the beginning of 2008 include an increase in call response and patient treatment/transport of 40%.

Need
Today, the downtown Brooklyn area and indeed New York City in general faces many new and familiar challenges.  Population increases, growth in the number and density of residences, expansion of commercial and industrial enterprises, and development of new chemical compounds (i.e. hazardous materials) combine with a skyrocketing percentage of the population diagnosed with asthma, diabetes, hypertension, cardiac problems, and morbid obesity.  New weapons of mass destruction have emerged and the metropolitan area has already been proven to be a prime target for terrorism.

The 911 EMS system in New York City is the largest and busiest in the United States of America. EMS receives approximately 1.3 million emergency calls every year, with units responding to over three thousand EMS runs every day.  The numbers of emergency calls is projected to increase to a daily average of 4,000 calls for help throughout the summer into the fall.

The New York State Department of Health’s Bureau of Emergency Medical Services (NYS DOH BEMS) establishes general protocols and regulations and licenses EMS agencies and personnel.  The New York City Regional Emergency Medical Services Council, an arm of the NYS DOH BEMS, coordinates the Metropolitan area’s prehospital EMS resources, local protocols, and local certification of personnel.  The New York City Fire Department (FDNY) operates the 911 EMS response system, including answering and dispatching 911 calls and providing ambulances and personnel. FDNY contracts with some hospitals and private companies to provide 911 ambulance coverage.  Dozens of local, community-based volunteer ambulance corps supplement FDNY resources with ambulances and crews via a mutual aid relationship.

Call types are categorized by priority and range from the less serious, such as minor injuries, flu-like symptoms, and psychological emergencies to more severe conditions such as auto accidents, pedestrians struck by cars, seizures, asthma attacks, abdominal pain, ob/gyn emergencies, fractures and lacerations, allergic reactions, and assaults.  The most life-threatening calls include unconscious patients, gunshot and stabbing victims, head trauma, cardiac/chest pain, strokes/traumatic brain injury, difficulty breathing, altered mental status/diabetic emergencies, amputations, respiratory failure, and ultimately sudden cardiac arrest due to medical or traumatic reasons.

To provide response to such a large and diverse number of calls, the system needs experienced, qualified Emergency Medical Technicians (EMTs) and Paramedics.  EMTs provide Basic Life Support: the ability to stabilize and treat injuries and simple medical emergencies, such as administering albuterol to an asthma patient or oral glucose to a conscious diabetic.  They also are able to perform CPR and semi-automated external defibrillation to patients in cardiac arrest.  Paramedics provide Advanced Life Support to the most serious calls and are able to administer a wide variety of intravenous medications and fluid replacement, advanced electrical cardiac therapy such as pacing (external pacemaker function) and cardioversion (synchronized defibrillation), and advanced airway management through intubation, needle chest decompression (similar to a chest tube), and cricothyroidotomy (a technique to invasively establish an patent airway directly into a patient’s trachea).

Unfortunately, there is a shortage of EMS personnel in the 911 system.  Turnover is high, as much as 25-30%.  One reason for the high attrition rate is that FDNY EMTs and Medics (who comprise 60% of 911 EMS personnel) must work 25 years in order to collect retirement, whereas firefighters and police officers are eligible after only 20 years.  Many leave the field of EMS for a better paying career as a Firefighter, Police Officer, Sanitation Worker, Court Officer, or Transit Worker.  A “catch-22” situation also exists:  it is difficult to be hired as a 911 EMT or Paramedic without experience working NYC 911 EMS response.