The Oregonian – by Jessica Floum
Portland Fire & Rescue will start a pilot program in which firefighters and paramedics make home visits to help chronically ill patients recently discharged from a local hospital avoid readmission.
The City Council unanimously adopted the program Wednesday. Legacy Good Samaritan Medical Center will contract city firefighters, paramedics and nurses to check on at-risk patients it discharges to homes in Portland.
The program will serve as a six-month trial of how firefighters can assist medical facilities with patient care.
“We’re excited about it,” said Commissioner Dan Saltzman, who is in charge of the fire bureau. “We think there is a role we can provide in addressing the community’s health and well-being. We think it fits well with the skills the firefighters have.”
The hospital will pay the city up to $50,000 over the course of six months to send trained paramedics and nurses from the fire bureau to check on hospital patients with chronic conditions like heart failure, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and diabetes.
The medical facility’s case management team will refer patients to the fire bureau, which will ask patients to voluntarily enroll in the program, then set up an appointment within two weeks of them leaving the hospital.
The Mobile Healthcare Services Program will also give firefighters and paramedics the opportunity to check with vulnerable community members on the condition of their homes and other concerns.
The bureau hopes the proactive approach will reduce the number of unnecessary non-emergency calls to 911 and improve the use of Emergency Medical Services resources.
If the program is successful, the bureau may add positions to maintain both the program and its traditional fire services.
The city has 30 fire stations, 30 engine companies, one heavy rescue crew, a paramedic rescue crew and two squads dedicated to chemical, biological and explosive response.
“Portland Fire & Rescue is working on being important in all aspects, not just responding to 911,” said Ken Burns, deputy chief of emergency medical services.
–Jessica Floum
http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2017/01/portland_firefighters_to_visit.html
“The Mobile Healthcare Services Program will also give firefighters and paramedics the opportunity to check with vulnerable community members on the condition of their homes and other concerns.”
Anyone who volunteers for this is a fool. The enemy force in occupation wants everyone to know that their viewpoint is that all land, the houses on them, and the people who live in them are their property to dispose of as they see fit. They believe that all of their property is open to inspection anytime they see fit. We used to laugh about the communist prison the USSR used to be, and look where we are today, far worse.
sure they are
as one of them is “tending to the ill” the other is rummaging through the house for guns and money
Another “feel good” intrusion into peoples’ privacy. This will be used as another thin edge of the thick wedge.
Can U Say I Told U So:
DHS uses firefighters to enter homes and give everyone ‘fire risk assessments’
http://massprivatei.blogspot.com/2016/10/dhs-uses-firefighters-to-enter-homes.html#!/2016/10/dhs-uses-firefighters-to-enter-homes.html
“We think there is a role we can provide in addressing the community’s health and well-being.”
There is.
Killing pigs would BEST serve the ‘community’s health and well-being’.