Airdrie’s Fire Department first on scene before EMS nearly half the time 

A recent monetary donation by Airdrie philanthropist, Tracy Osborne, to Airdrie’s Fire Department, dubbed the “Made-in-Airdrie" solution in response to extended Emergency Medical Services (EMS) wait times has put the conundrum of lagging emergency response times back to the front and center of public discourse in the city. 

The undisclosed amount of money donated by Ms. Osborne will go towards purchasing equipment for the fire department which will allow them to gain more immersive training ‘in-house’, in turn allowing firefighters to use that training during medical co-response calls, bolstering patient care on-scene. This is directly tied to the issue of wait times for EMS that Airdrie’s Fire Department experiences once they are on the scene of a medical co-response call. 

According to data received by Discover Airdrie from Airdrie’s Fire Department, in 2021, the fire department was first to arrive on scene before EMS 47.8 per cent of the time for Delta calls and 46.38 per cent of the time for Echo calls.

The average total call time for medical co-response calls in 2021 was 22 minutes and 21 seconds; however, this includes the clock starting from the point of dispatch,  response time to a scene, the wait times on scene as well as a crew going back into service – or leaving a scene. The fire department’s average response time to a scene averaged five minutes and 43 seconds.  

“Delta is a serious life-threatening response at an advanced life support level and an echo level response is a life-status questionable, which is the closest available units or multiple resources being sent,” explained Acting Deputy Chief of Operations for Airdrie’s Fire Department, Mike Pirie 

Acting Deputy Chief Pirie said that the fire department will only respond to Alpha and Bravo medical calls only if EMS initiates such a request. Charlie calls are only responded to by the fire department if EMS is expected to be ten minutes or longer in responding or if EMS initiates a request.  

The Airdrie Fire Department responded first almost half the time to co-medical calls (Data provided by Airdrie Fire Department)

There was 975 co-medical response calls that the fire department responded to in 2021, amounting to almost 50 per cent of the total call volume the fire department received. 795 calls were Delta codes, while August 2021 saw the highest amount of co-medical response calls, totalling 112. January 2021 had the lowest co-medical response calls; 61. 

The longest 50 co-medical response calls averaged 58 minutes and 54 seconds, while 13 calls were over one hour. The longest call of 2021 clocked in at two hours and three minutes. While the longest 50 per cent of calls averaged 32 minutes and 24 seconds. 

“It’s important that we don't have extended scene times with patients for two reasons; one is the ultimate goal is to get the patient the care they need, and transport to medical care,” Deputy Chief Pirie said. “[If] we have a fire truck that's sitting on the scene for an extended period of time for 20 or 30 minutes, then they're not able to go to calls like a structure fire or a car accident, or quite frankly, even another medical call. It impacts service; and yes, that does occur.” 

Pareto Chart showing the disbursement of call lengths (Data provided by Airdrie Fire Department)

Pirie, however, did underscore that it’s not just the matter of EMS, but all calls affect the fire department in this manner. However, he noted that in the most recent weeks there seems to be some improvement, though it is too early to tell if this is part of a long-term trend that may be due to the province initiating a 10-point plan as well as an Alberta EMS Provincial Advisory Committee. The plan as well as the committee is meant to ‘provide immediate and long-term recommendations to enhance emergency medical service to Albertans’. 

“I've received fewer complaints and in the last few weeks, I certainly haven't had any reports from our crews of 30- or 40-minutes scene times. I think anecdotally, it feels like we might be seeing some relief, [but] think it's too early to tell,” he said. “Some of those points [from the 10-point plan] don't actually become initiated, I believe until April.” 

Pirie also remarked that the relationship between Airdrie’s Fire Department and EMS, on the whole, is a positive partnership. 

“Certainly, operationally, at a field level, our staff [are] absolutely work closely with AHS field staff to make sure that people get good care,” Pirie said. “When we say things like scene times are extended, that's not to say, ‘what poor service you're providing,’; it’s to say, we need you [EMS] to be there quicker so that our customer gets good service and so it doesn't affect the fire service any further.” 

The issue of extended scene times for medical services was also part of a closed meeting session of Airdrie’s City Council on March 7th, the same day Ms. Osborne presented in front of the council, alongside various representatives of Airdrie’s Fire Department, including outgoing Fire Chief Kevin Weinberger. Closed sessions are not made public and cannot be requested via the Freedom of information and Protection of Privacy Act due to disclosure being harmful to the business interests of a third party and advice from officials. 

Previously, Discover Airdrie reported that Airdrie EMS responded to over 60 per cent of emergency calls to Calgary and only 30 percent in Airdrie in 2021. The highest number of calls that Airdrie EMS responded to in Calgary was in December 2021, with a total of 841 responses, while within Airdrie, there were 253 responses.  

According to data from Airdrie’s Fire Department in December 2021, the fire department responded to 84 co-medical response calls, the 5th highest amount of medical response calls that year. Conversely, in August 2021, when Airdrie’s Fire Department responded to the highest amount of co-medical response calls, Airdrie’s EMS responded to 730 calls in Calgary and 264 in Airdrie, making that month the third-highest in calls responded by Airdrie EMS in Calgary.  

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