Ep 31. NAEMT Radio – EMS on the Hill and NAEMT Legislative Issues

Recorded at the 2024 NAEMT EMS on the Hill event, Rob Lawrence chats with NAEMT President Susan Bailey and President Elect Chris Way on the bills and issues that are being discussed with elected officials and their staff this year.

Urge Congress to Support EMS Reimbursement for Treatment in Place (TIP)

NAEMT has long advocated for providing EMS agencies the flexibility to navigate patients to the right care in the right setting through federal and state reimbursement of Treatment in Place (TIP). Neither Medicaid nor Medicare currently cover TIP; because EMS is not reimbursed for care unless a patient is brought to the hospital, the current EMS economic model incentivizes transportation to a hospital emergency department, even when a less expensive level of care is appropriate.

 Reimbursing EMS agencies for TIP will save Medicare billions of dollars on unnecessary emergency department visits, shorten task times for EMS agencies struggling with workforce shortages, help decompress overcrowded hospitals and emergency departments, and meet patients’ needs without long waits at the hospital. Many hospitals hold EMS personnel for hours waiting for an available bed in the emergency department, keeping EMS responders from getting back into service and ready for the next emergency in the community.

Request House Support for the Community Paramedicine Act of 2024

Request support from your House Representatives for H.R. 8042, the Community Paramedicine Act of 2024, introduced by Representatives Emanuel Cleaver (D-MO) and Kelly Armstrong (R-ND). This bill would create a grant program under the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) that would authorize $25 million per year for five years to support community paramedicine services; award qualified entities up to $750,000 for individual applications and $1.5 million for joint applications; and establish an advisory board comprised of national community paramedicine, emergency medical service, and fire service organizations to advise, assist, and peer review grant applications in rural and underserved areas.

SIREN ACT

The SIREN Act was signed into law on December 20, 2018. This law created a grant program for public and non-profit EMS agencies and fire departments in rural areas to support the recruitment, retention, education, and equipping of EMS personnel. Rural EMS agencies and fire departments often lack the resources to pay for even basic operational needs, and this program is aimed at helping meet some of those needs.

 This successful program needs to be reauthorized. Senators Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Susan Collins (R-ME) and Representatives David Joyce (R-OH) and Debbie Dingell (D-MI) have introduced the SIREN Reauthorization Act, S. 265 and H.R. 4646. These bills would reauthorize SIREN Act grants for an additional five years, through 2028. S. 265 passed the Senate in December 2023.

Encourage Congress to include $32M in FY2025 for SIREN Grants

Take action today to encourage Congress to include $32M in the FY2025 budget for the Rural EMS Training and Equipment Assistance (REMSTEA) grant program, otherwise known as the SIREN grants. The REMSTEA/SIREN Act grant program, administered by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), is a critical lifeline for budget-challenged rural EMS agencies and fire departments. The grants have provided much-needed funding to assist in procuring medication and medical supplies, recruiting and retaining personnel, increasing service levels from Basic Life Support to Advanced Life Support, and even replacing older ambulances with newer and safer models.

Ask Congress to Protect Access to Ground Ambulance Medical Services

S.1673 and H.R. 1666 would extend the current temporary increases under the Medicare ambulance fee schedule of 2% urban, 3% rural and 22.6% super rural for another three years, through December 31, 2027. Without the extension of these ground ambulance add-ons, many ambulance service organizations will not be able to continue serving their communities.

Resources

Online Legislative Service: Online Legislative Service (naemt.org)

Join the NAEMT

https://www.naemt.org/join/join

About our Guests

Susan Bailey, MSEM, NRP, is the Director of the Louisiana Bureau of Emergency Medical Services and part-time faculty at Columbia Southern University where she teaches courses such as EMS Operations and Personnel Management, Risk Management Practices in EMS, and Finance of EMS Systems. She has been active in the EMS Industry since 1990 with experience in both the rural and urban setting. She has served as the NAEMT representative on the Commission on Accreditation of Prehospital Continuing Education (CAPCE) Board of Directors and was chair from 2018-2022.

A lifetime NAEMT member, Susan served as Vice-Chair of NAEMT’s Advocacy Committee, Chair of the Disaster Preparedness Committee, Chair of the Affiliate Advisory Committee. She also served on the Education Committee and the Finance Committee. In 2014, she was awarded the NASCO/NAEMT Paramedic of the Year Award, and in 2016 she was awarded an NAEMT Education Service Award for innovation in delivering NAEMT education programs to rural areas. Susan is a lifetime member of the Louisiana Association of National Registered EMTs (LANREMT). LANREMT awarded her the Instructor of the Year Award in 1999, a Presidential Meritorious Award in 2013, and an Outstanding Achievement award in 2018. In July 2022 she received a Raising the Bar Recognition from Columbia Southern University.

Passionate about the EMS Industry, Susan strives to bring positive attention to the work that EMS Practitioners do. She encourages EMS practitioners to expand their knowledge to grow with an ever-changing scope of practice within the EMS industry. A Lean Six Sigma Green Belt, Susan has a bachelor’s degree in management from Southeastern Louisiana University where she graduated magna cum laude, and earned her master’s degree in emergency management from Millersville University in Pennsylvania.

About Chris Way

Christopher Way has been an emergency service professional for 28 years. Chief Way transitioned to Kootenai County Fire and Rescue as the Fire Chief in May of 2020 after serving as the Chief Officer for the Kootenai Count EMS System for the previous seven years.

Chief Way came to Idaho from Kansas where he served in Fire and EMS roles in urban, suburban and rural settings. He was an EMT-Basic, EMT-Intermediate and now has been a licensed paramedic since 1994 as well as a certified Firefighter. Throughout his career he has held different ranks culminating most recently in his promotion to Fire Chief.  He also has significant experience in disaster management at the local, state and national level.

In addition to his full-time role as Fire Chief he is involved at the local, regional, state and national level in advocacy and leadership for emergency services.  He is the Treasurer for the National EMT Association and has served on their board and committees for several years.  He is a regular speaker at national conferences and in his spare time Chief Way and two partners own an Emergency Medicine education and consulting company. 

Passionate about emergency medical care, Governor Brad Little selected Chief Way to be the Chairman of the Idaho Time Sensitive Emergency Council in May of 2019. He has a bachelor’s degree in Management and Human Relations and maintains all of his Fire and EMS licenses/certifications.  He regularly donates time to his community, serves local non-profit organizations and is involved in his children’s many activities. Christopher and his wife Jennifer live in Hayden, Idaho with their two daughters and four Labradors.