EMS Transition

Responsibility for ground ambulance was transferred from municipalities to Alberta Health Services April 1, 2009. The new provincial EMS model will improve Albertans’ access to emergency medical services, no matter when or where they find themselves in need of emergency care.

Transitioning EMS into health provides opportunities such as standardizing medical processes, ensuring paramedics and EMTs are working to their full potential, improving utilization of ambulance fleet, and providing enhanced educational opportunities to all EMS staff regardless of where they live.

• There are over 550 ambulances currently in the system across Alberta of which almost 300 are Alberta Health Services ambulances.
• The remaining 250 are owned and operated by the approximately 50 service providers supplying ground ambulance services under contract with Alberta Health Services.
• Approximately 3,000 ambulance care attendants are projected to attend 400,000 ground ambulance calls this year.
• More than 40 per cent of the projected calls will be inter-facility transfer calls where a patient is transferred from one health care facility to another.
• The other 60 per cent are 9-1-1 calls for emergency medical services.

Included in the provincial announcement to transition EMS to health was direction to consolidate EMS dispatch. The staggered approach to consolidate 35 EMS dispatch centres to three began April 1, 2009. To date, 17 consolidations have taken place. Read more...

A review is underway of the dispatch consolidation process to capture the learnings to date and see where improvements can be made. Changes will be made going forward to make this process even smoother.

It is important to note that the EMS transition to health and ongoing dispatch consolidation changes nothing for the public. If you need an ambulance, phone 9-1-1. The dispatch centre that used to take your call will still take your call. If the call taker determines an ambulance is required, they will patch in to the EMS dispatch centre and an ambulance will be sent.

In addition to ground ambulance services, Alberta Health Services assumed responsibility of ensuring air ambulance services are available on April 1, 2010.

Fixed wing air ambulance is conducted by 7 providers contracted by Alberta Health Services. These providers operate from 10 bases located across Alberta. Additionally, STARS has an affiliation agreement with Alberta Health Services to provide dedicated rotary air ambulance service from bases in Calgary, Edmonton and Grande Prairie.

The effective coordination of all emergency medical services (ground emergency, ground inter-facility, air and dispatch) to ensure safe, high-quality and timely emergency medical care is Alberta Health Services unwavering goal.