McLean, Texas forced to survive without EMS

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McLean, Texas forced to survive without EMS

9-1-1 in the News, Community | April | December 5, 2011 at 11:57 am

MCLEAN, TX — When you dial 9-1-1 for a medical emergency, you probably expect to get almost immediate service, an ambulance that comes directly to you and takes you to the hospital.

But for one small Texas town, that hasn’t been the case lately.

McLean, a town of fewer than 900 residents, is surviving right now without an emergency medical service in their community — paid or volunteer.

“As time went by, we aged out,” said Mayor of McLean, Peggy Baer. “The volunteers got older, they moved away, they took new jobs.”

For about the past year and a half, McLean residents, if faced with a medical emergency, would have to call an ambulance from a nearby community like Pampa, Groom, Shamrock or even Clarendon. But now, even those towns are having a difficult time servicing McLean because of lack of personnel.

“Their volunteers come out of town on a run,” said the Mayor, “bring one of their trucks and they have a disaster in their town, what are they left with? Probably not coverage for their own town, so they can’t promise coverage for us anymore. We’re the hole in the donut,” she added.

That’s forced McLean to utilize Lifestar or sometimes even their own vehicles in an emergency. What’s even more surprising, McLean actually has two ambulances but no one to run them. That’s why a few locals came together to reorganize an EMS Committee to try and get their own volunteer EMT program back up and running.

“Hopefully we can get enough people to pass our EMT class that maybe we can fire up our own ambulance and be able to take care of the people here in town,” said President of the EMS Committee, Jake Hess.

Because without it, these citizens fear the aging community of McLean will continue to do just that — grow old, with no one there to replace it.

“Who’s going to move to McLean without an ambulance service and without any kind of doctors,” asked Hess.

“It’s going to happen to other small towns, too,” added Mayor Baer. “We are just the first casualty.”

Read the story here.