Full Notification

Maricopa, ARIZ. (November 3, 2014) The City of Maricopa Fire Department has been awarded the distinction of Premier Emergency Medical Service (EMS) Agency from the Arizona Department of Health Services (DHS). The Department has become one of only three fire departments in Pinal County to be a Premier EMS Agency. This program, and its requirements, is a voluntary commitment to the Department of Health Services to be part of an initiative that focuses on exceptional pre-hospital emergency medical care through data collection and information exchange. The data collected by fire crews is used for training, quality control and improvement.

In order to achieve this title, the Department had to prove a commitment to implement four key requirements into its EMS program. Those requirements are: Commitment of Leadership, Data Collection & Submission, Quality Assurance & Performance Improvement, Submission to Arizona Pre-Hospital Information and EMS Registry System (AZ-PIERS).

“We are very excited to have earned this distinction,” states City of Maricopa Fire Department Emergency Medical Service Coordinator Cindy Inskeep, “over the past year we have worked very hard to improve our EMS compliance and data collection, we thank the Department of Health Services for the recognition of the work that our members have done to make this possible.”

One of the major improvement the fire department have made over the last year was the transition from paper patient care reports (PCR) to electronic PCRs. Fire Department Paramedics now utilize laptops and software that enables more efficient collection of data which is shared with hospitals and the Department of Health Services to ensure that the best patient care was provided to the patients.

As a commitment to the citizens of City of Maricopa, the fire department voluntarily participated in this program which includes submitting all its electronic reports to the state for quality control and assurance that department personal are providing the highest level of EMS care.

For more information on the DHS Premier EMS Agency Program please visit:

http://www.azdhs.gov/bems/data/PEAP.htm