ST. PETERS, Mo. — This week St. Charles Co. Ambulance District (SCCAD) opened two new multi-million-dollar ambulance posts that department leaders said will better serve the needs of their community.
At St. Charles Co. Ambulance headquarters, the phones seemingly never stop ringing.
“We anticipate ending this year with right at 50,000 calls for service,” Director of Community Outreach Kyle Gaines said.
“A heavy percentage of the calls we go on aren’t necessarily what ambulances were created with in mind,” Chief Kelly Cope said.
With that in mind they spent more than $5 million on two new posts on each side of 364 that will serve the county in a variety of ways.
“We have an embedded SWAT team members that help with SWAT activity that goes on,” Cope said. “We have urban search and rescue component where we have medical specialists that go out and do rescue. It’s just a variety of needs that are out there.”
The fastest growing percentage of calls in Missouri’s fastest growing county are often related to mental health, so SCCAD recently launched a pilot program that is already showing positive results.
“We use a telemedicine connection with a master’s level clinician for mental health care,” Cope said. “We can engage patients directly with someone who can help them directly with their problem that maybe they didn’t need to go to an ER.”
However, they’re running into a problem.
“We’re competing with numbers like $21 an hour for folks at a warehouse or $17-$18 for people working at a fast-food restaurant,” Cope said. “That’s great for those folks, but the level of impact for the folks that we have and the level of training and the type of work that they do we have to be able to compensate them effectively.”
A pay increase is scheduled for St. Charles Co. Ambulance employees in 2024.
Gaines said the department will need to add roughly 100 positions in the department in the next decade to continue serving the needs of St. Charles Co. as it continues expanding.
“No matter what the situation our goal is improving patient outcomes,” Gaines said.
If you are interested in applying for a position at St. Charles Co. Ambulance District, click here.
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