As EMS and hospital leaders in Teller County, Colorado watched cities like New York grapple with COVID-19 in March of 2020, they knew they needed to carefully plan their response. Fear of the virus spread even faster than the virus itself, and it quickly became apparent that nearly half of Teller County’s residents were reluctant to seek care—for any condition—at the hospital.
Dr. Jeremy DeWall, EMS Medical Director for the Teller region, observed the trend firsthand. “Up to 40% of our EMS volume does not want to go to the hospital once 911 arrives,” he said. “Looking at our numbers, the fear was that we were missing a large group of people who were without healthcare or afraid to go to healthcare because of COVID-19.”
Teller County has a robust and successful community paramedicine program, and were already using Pulsara, a healthcare communication and telehealth platform, for EMS and hospital communication when COVID-19 hit. Their paramedics were accustomed to securely sharing patient information and communicating with the hospital through the Pulsara platform.
That gave James McLaughlin, Director of Community Paramedicine at Ute Pass Regional Health Service District, an idea. McLaughlin joined forces with Dr. DeWall and Emergency Medical Specialists, PC to set in motion a 911-initiated telemedicine program, allowing community paramedics to continue to serve patients and get them examined by a board-certified emergency physician—from their homes.
Read the case study to learn how UPRHSD and EMS, PC worked together to continue to care for patients through the COVID-19 pandemic, reaching underserved populations and providing their community with a personalized, high-quality level of care.
To learn more about how hospitals and EMS organizations are using Pulsara to improve communication, reduce treatment times, and mitigate the spread of COVID-19, check out our customer success stories.
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