It's hasn't yet been a month since the city's ambulance dispatch service was consolidated with the province and glitches with the new system are already being reported.
During Monday night's council meeting, Mayor Nolan Crouse asked for an update from city manager Bill Holtby about the new service and what has happened to date.
“It's been cumbersome, and we are working with Alberta Health Services (AHS) and Strathcona County to resolve it,” said Holtby, who later said he heard about the issue last Thursday. “We don't have anything we would consider a horror story.”
The dispatch centre was transferred to Strathcona County on Feb. 8, and reports are starting to come out about issues with communication, technological issues between the dispatch and ambulance systems and other minor issues. According to St. Albert fire chief Ray Richards, his office is already working to compile data about the first month of operations and take any outstanding concerns at that time to AHS.
“There are a lot of growing pains and the full impact of them isn't known yet,” he said. “Some of the things we've been experiencing are normal.”
Crouse said he wasn't surprised to hear about issues surrounding communication between the dispatch centre and paramedics. He believes it is proof that the consolidation was not a good idea.
“They're dispatching from an out of town area and they don't know the local lingo,” said Crouse. “I'm going to be penetrating this further and finding out what the real issues are.”
He added that if the issues were not resolved soon, he would take them to AHS himself to seek answers and find out how to fix them as soon as possible.
Stu Williams, manager of the AHS central communications centre for the northern Alberta area, said he wasn't informed of any recent issues with the city's dispatch services, but planned to follow up and ensure any issues are handled as quickly as possible.
“With any consolidation, there is a challenge with technology,” said Williams. “There are things that need to be worked on … the St. Albert Fire Department is a great partner to work with.”
Richards said the new service was not an amateur one, but a professional service that has dealt with other consolidations with a few glitches; something he said is not unusual.
“There are always glitches when you change systems,” he said. “Everybody's doing a good job of dealing with the new issues.”
