Rural populations who reside great distances from hospital emergency departments or urgent care facilities need timely and effective prehospital EMS. Yet rural EMS agencies face significant challenges sustaining adequate staffing and staff competencies. Configuring an agency's workforce to match appropriately trained providers with patient volume and case mix may help maintain high-quality patient care. This project aimed to examine the relationship between the accumulated experience of EMS personnel and provision of evidence-based care, comparing rural and urban EMS systems. Study results inform policy options to improve the quality of prehospital EMS care in rural areas.

Publications

• Prehospital Emergency Medical Services Personnel: Comparing Rural and Urban Professional Experience and Provision of Evidence-Based Care
  Policy Brief
  WWAMI Rural Health Research Center
  Date: 05/2022
  This policy brief examines the effects of emergency medical services (EMS) personnel level of experience and agency rurality on the provision of evidenced-based care. Compared with urban-serving EMS agencies, rural-serving agencies provided evidence-based care less often for stroke, hypoglycemia, and trauma but more often for seizures.