Recruiting is underway for what will be a beefed up provincial ambulance service in Granisle.
Current projections are for new staffers to be in position on April 1 following an expansion of ambulance service throughout rural and remote locations in B.C. first announced last November.
The service in Granisle is moving from what is called a scheduled on-call system of four regular part time positions with only two of them currently filled.
One of the two filled positions is that of a unit chief/community paramedic and the other is a community paramedic/scheduled on all paramedic. The vacant regular part time positions are filled by a pool of four on-call paramedics.
But as of this spring, the ambulance service is moving to what is called a mix shift schedule increasing from four regular part time positions to eight regular part time positions which are the equivalent to a .75 position for on-duty hours.
“Converting from scheduled on-call staffing to mix shift staffing will also increase the number of hours paramedics are staffed in the station, from 8 hours to 16 hours,” indicates information provided by the provincial ambulance service.
“For mix shift, there are two crews alternating the day and night shift.”
The increase in crews comes with increased hours at the ambulance station for paramedics.
“The in-station duty hours for mix shift of 16 hours are covered by two crews working over a 24-hour period. Crew A on the day shift works 12 hours in-station, and Crew B on night shift works four paid hours in-station and the rest as on-call duty hours,” the provided information continues.
“The part-time employees on mix shift work two 12-hour days followed by two nights (composed of 4 regular hours and 8 on-call hours, with on-call time paid at $12 an hour).”
The new on-call rate is a significant increase over the $2 an hour in the last ambulance service collective agreement.
Specific to Granisle, there is also to be a full-time community paramedic position.
The community is one of 25 moving to the mix shift model which, says B.C. Emergency Health Services, will “provide staff with more flexibility and better work/life balance.”
Another 21 communities are moving to an alpha model of 24/7 coverage, the coverage now in Houston, and 14 communities are to have a full-time permanent unit chief who will then work on recruiting local people to become paramedics.
With the addition of more paramedic hours, B.C. Emergency Health Services says there will be 271 full time positions for an increase of 239.5 full-time equivalent positions.