'We're taking action': B.C.'s new ambulance boss gives first interview
She was appointed less than two weeks after the catastrophic heat dome claimed hundreds of lives and the health-care system was inundated with sick and dying British Columbians. Now, the province’s new top paramedic is speaking about changes at the ambulance service for the first time.
Leanne Heppell has been the Chief Ambulance Officer at BC Emergency Health Services for four months, overseeing operations and staffing of ambulance paramedics, call-takers and dispatchers.
"It's the largest transformation that we've had in the entire service, it's a huge amount of staff that we're hiring: over 600 in the province,” she said, defending the figure even when CTV News pointed out most of the jobs are part-time-to-full-time conversions, rather than new positions.
“This is a chance to stabilize our staff in these communities by providing them with permanent positions and permanent benefits.”
Heppell insists that recruitment efforts are going well, despite widespread criticism of the career path for paramedics. Most typically start their careers in small towns, earning just $2 per hour to be on call for service, with the precarious work lasting for years before they earn enough seniority and experience for a full-time job.
"We're coming very close to ending the pager pay,” said Heppell, who said she’s taking all measures possible to shore up staffing levels amid a 30-per-cent absentee rate.
“We're taking action. We're doing a variety of different fronts to try and strengthen the service, and so one of the main things we're doing right now is recruiting and getting as many staff as we possibly can into the service."
PRIORITIZING THE BIGGEST ISSUES
CTV News has learned that the ambulance service has faced critical shortages in key areas, notably among call-takers. They have had as few as eight positions staffed out of the two dozen typically needed to cover the province on a busy Friday night, a figure Heppell did not dispute.
"That was why we did the big recruitment drive. Our call volumes have gone up, particularly in the summer, so in addition to recruiting we have changed the model in dispatch,” she said. “We've added paramedic specialists, we've added physicians, nurses – all of that is assisting our call-takers in addition to our 24-7 (management staffing).”
BCEHS is also expanding a community shuttle program that started as a pilot project in Fraser Health. The Low Acuity Response Unit is staffed by paramedics who take patients needing transportation for non-emergency medical attention to urgent care centres rather than hospitals, leaving ambulances free to handle urgent calls.
Heppel has also been assigning managers to more hands-on duties, making sure one is always in the call-taking centre to support dispatchers and the paramedics giving life-saving medical advice, as well as sending them to the Granville entertainment district on Halloween weekend.
NEW BOSS BUT OLD LEADERSHIP REMAINS
Despite being unable to answer why extra staff weren’t called in during the record-breaking temperatures forecast during the heat dome, BCEHS says no executives have lost their jobs. Several frontline workers tell CTV News that unless there are more leadership changes, they are skeptical the morale issues and direction of the service can improve.
A pay scale well below other first responders and health-care-worker peers is leading to some paramedics leaving to work in the private sector or for better-paying work as firefighters. Heppell isn’t committing to a pay raise to improve retention, but is undeterred in her confidence that she can turn the ship around with the province investing money and resources.
“It's a combination of bringing in more staff and coming up with more innovative ways of managing the high demand of the call volumes," she said. “There is no one service in health care that can function on their own, we have to work in a collaborative model supporting each other.”
This is the fourth part of a CTV News Vancouver series examining British Columbia’s pre-hospital care system.
Part one: Not just a paramedic issue: What's behind 911 call delays in B.C.
Part two: B.C. family doctor shortage impacting 911 service and ambulance waits
Part three: B.C. paramedics understaffed by up to 40 per cent daily due to burnout, injuries, vacancies
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Quebec nurse had to clean up after husband's death in Montreal hospital
On a night she should have been mourning, a nurse from Quebec's Laurentians region says she was forced to clean up her husband after he died at a hospital in Montreal.
Cuban government apologizes to Montreal-area family after delivering wrong body
Cuba's foreign affairs minister has apologized to a Montreal-area family after they were sent the wrong body following the death of a loved one.
What is changing about Canada's capital gains tax and how does it impact me?
The federal government's proposed change to capital gains taxation is expected to increase taxes on investments and mainly affect wealthy Canadians and businesses. Here's what you need to know about the move.
'Anything to win': Trudeau says as Poilievre defends meeting protesters
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is accusing Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre of welcoming 'the support of conspiracy theorists and extremists,' after the Conservative leader was photographed meeting with protesters, which his office has defended.
Northern Ont. lawyer who abandoned clients in child protection cases disbarred
A North Bay, Ont., lawyer who abandoned 15 clients – many of them child protection cases – has lost his licence to practise law.
Boeing's financial woes continue, while families of crash victims urge U.S. to prosecute the company
Boeing said Wednesday that it lost US$355 million on falling revenue in the first quarter, another sign of the crisis gripping the aircraft manufacturer as it faces increasing scrutiny over the safety of its planes and accusations of shoddy work from a growing number of whistleblowers.
Bank of Canada officials split on when to start cutting interest rates
Members of the Bank of Canada's governing council were split on how long the central bank should wait before it starts cutting interest rates when they met earlier this month.
Fair in Ontario, flurries in Labrador: Weather systems make for an erratic spring
"It's a bit of a complicated pattern; we've got a lot going on," said Jennifer Smith of the Meteorological Service of Canada in an interview with CTVNews.ca on Wednesday. "[As is] typical with weather, all of these things are related."
Police tangle with students in Texas and California as wave of campus protest against Gaza war grows
Police tangled with student demonstrators in Texas and California while new encampments sprouted Wednesday at Harvard and other colleges as school leaders sought ways to defuse a growing wave of pro-Palestinian protests.