Board Members Present: Bureau Staff:
Gloria Murawsky Paul Wittkamp
Steve Bane Brian Litza
Brenda Fellenz Cathy Etter
Troy Haase Helen Pullen
Cal Lintz Ann Moses
Ken Johnson Marianne Peck
Joe Covelli Dan Williams
Tracy Aldrich Keith Wesley
Travis Teesch
Steve Teale
Board Members Excused:
Mark Fredrickson
Others in Attendance: Representing:
Joe Jensen Regions Hospital EMS
Tom Brazelton EMSC/UW Children’s
Gregory West Waukesha County Technical College
Jerry Miller LifeQuest/Mobile Healthcare Alliance
Jan Beyer UW EMS Program
Ann Krainyk UW EMS Program
Joyce Anderson DHFS/DPH/MCH/EMSC
John Huot Life Link III
Chris Schultz Life Link III
Corey Sargent Life Link III
Tom Thrash Antigo Fire Dept.
Cindy Lazorik WITC Ashland
Beth Natter Mercy Health System - Janesville
Fred Hornby Bell Ambulance
Suzanne Martens Sheboygan County EMS
Don Kimlicka St. Clare Hospital, Weston, WI
Jeff Grimm Theda Star/STAC
Bob Nack Fox Valley RTAC
Susan Harvey DHFS – EMSC
Craig Nelson Baldwin EMS
Ann Peggs PFFW
Nettie Jenkins Thedacare
Steve Stroman Aurora Bay Care/STAC
Dan Diamon Lake Superior RTAC
Jim Austad Oshkosh Fire Dept.
John Duffy Fond Du Lac Fire Dept.
Brian Reynolds Milwaukee County EMS Council
Tom Fennell Gold Cross-Mayo Medical Transport
Keith Kesler Douglas County Emergency Management
Jan Victorson Bayfield County Emergency Management
Dan Hufer Green County EMS
Mindy Allen Green County EMS
Frank Koehn South Shore EMS
Judy Jones Luther Hosp Eau Claire/NWRTAC
Larry Knuth Paratech Ambulance
Robin Schultz Sacred Heart Hospital, Eau Claire
Welcome and Introductions: Chair Steve Bane called the meeting to order at 1:00 PM at the Sheraton - Madison, WI. Steve welcomed everyone and asked the Board and audience to introduce themselves.
1. Approval of previous Board Meeting Minutes:
A Motion by Covelli, second by Teesch, to approve the minutes from the April 2006 meeting. Motion Carried.
2. Committee Updates:
EMS Education: Gloria Murawsky, committee chair reported the following meeting topics:
1. Reviewed scope of practice for consistency with revised EMT-B Curriculum.
2. The pilot programs that will be ending in August will be evaluated using the tool that was created prior to the revisions to assure a consistent evaluation and to determine needed changes prior to full implementation.
3. Discussions are continuing on the various changes being proposed to the EMT-Refresher course. No recommendation has been forthcoming to date.
4. The next project will be to make the changes in the new Basic EMT Curriculum to the refresher course using the same model of a practice based. This will be started at the end of the pilots this summer.
5. Don Kimlicka will be chairing an ad hoc committee to work on the development of standardized competency skill evaluation sheets that will be presented to the EMS office for mandated inclusion in all EMS training courses.
6. The committee will plan to start a review of the Basic EMT standards and procedures document to assure consistency with the new curriculum. This will be completed after the pilots
7. There was a general discussion on EMT-B Instructor Qualifications. Further discussions will be held at future meetings.
EMS Policy and Practice Committee: Travis Teesch, committee chair reported the following meeting topics:
1. Verification of training was discussed in anticipation of a change in the education system. It was discussed again that it would the responsibility of the individual first to have documentation and verification of training and the provider that employees that person would also need that documentation. Further discussion and planning will take place to develop the specific plan.
2. It was reported that the revision of HFS-110 and HFS-111 will be completed and published the last week of the June. Public hearings will tentatively be held the third or fourth week of July 2006.
3. The Interfacility Transport Guidelines are essentially complete. NHTSA has just published a national model and a final review will be completed to compare the two documents to see if any gross information gaps exist.
4. The committee would like to support the IAFF Stand Down for Safety initiative that is being presented on a national level that emphasizes driver safety related issues.
5. The committee will be taking on the process to develop a transition plan for service medical protocols with the intent to move toward a more common template for protocols that is taking place by the PAC and EMS Office.
EMS Information Management: Ken Johnson, committee chair reported on the following:
1. It was reported that Ann Moses of the EMS Office provided an online demonstration of the WARDS system to committee members that proved to be very informational.
2. The committee reviewed some of the available reports and decided to get more specific examples of how reports would be helpful to service providers.
3. The committee discussed what constitutes a complete report with regards to the WARDS system. The committee will continue to discuss at what point from a data collection system standpoint the report will be complete.
4. A general discussion on NICE codes was held and will be discussed again in the future.
CQI – Sub-Committee. Ken Johnson, committee chair reported on the following.
1. The committee will be working on QA program that will be initially based on scene time evaluations. It is intended that services will then be able to use the developed program to assist them in determining whether they meet the norm for scene times.
EMS Public Health: Brenda Fellenz, committee chair reported on the following meeting topics:
1. Brenda had presented the EMSC pediatric falls program to the EMS Board at the last meeting to be considered at the June 7, 2006 meeting. Motion by Lintz, Second by Teesch to accept the EMSC Pediatric Falls program and to circulate to EMS providers in Wisconsin in the future. Motion Carried.
2. The committee reviewed and revised the EMS plan for Responding to Pandemic Influenza. It will be sent out to all Board members for review and action at the next Board meeting.
3. Ann Moses presented information on the early aberration reporting system that is available through the HAN (Wisconsin Health Alert Network).
4. Mary Powers provided information on how the Poison Control Center is able to monitor information obtained from callers on symptoms and then provide alerts in real time.
Disaster – Sub-Committee Mark Fredrickson, committee chair, reported on the
following meeting topics.
1. Disaster Sub-Committee did not meet.
EMS Systems: Cal Lintz, committee chair reported on the following meeting topics:
1. The committee completed the review of the EMS Providers Handbook & comparison the website. The committee also created a list of recommendations of items to be added to the State’s website to make it easier to navigate.
2. The committee also will be recommending that a section for Service Directors be added; a section for media relations type information that would be available for local media to learn more about EMS to provide background when needed for related EMS articles and finally add a section for Infection and Exposure control.
EMS-C:
1. Dr. Brazelton, Susan Harvey and Stu McVicar will be attending the National EMSC meeting in Washington D.C. in late June.
2. Susan Harvey announced that the Oconomowoc Junior Woman’s Club will be honored at the Washington meeting for the work that they have done for the Pediatric Jump kit project that provided pediatric equipped jump kits to all EMS providers in Waukesha County.
PAC: Dr. Charles Cady, PAC chairperson was unable to attend the meeting, Suzanne Marten reported on the following.
1. PAC has been tasked with the development of an evaluation process and form for the State EMS Director and is working on criteria and format based from the Medical Directors job description.
2. The committee is continuing on the project of review of current State protocol for the basic providers to assure protocols are in line with current practice and scope of practice revisions. They are also continuing on the larger project of development of State protocols for all levels of EMS providers that can be used as a template and modified by local EMS Medical Directors.
State Medical Directors’ Report: State EMS Medical Director, Dr. Keith Wesley gave the following report.
1. Dr. Wesley is working on a grant that will request funding for the enhancement of the medical directors course and the funding for a learning management system for the management of the entire program and the follow up testing process.
2. Dr. Wesley attended the National Association of EMS Educators training course and indicted that it was one of the finest course he has seen for EMS educators.
3. Announced that he was working with Dan to develop guidelines for services on how to transition to the 2005 AHA guidelines and hope to have something out later this summer.
4. Working with PAC on the development of standardized provider protocols.
State Trauma Report: Dr. Steve Stroman provided a report from the STAC meeting.
1. Dr. Stroman reported that June 25, 2006 through July 1, 2006 has been designated as Wisconsin Trauma Care Week. (Note: at time of meeting Governor Designation was pending.)
2. At the STAC meeting, August 2, 2006, Senator Ron Brown will be honored by STAC for his considerable contributions to solidification and stable funding initiative for the State Trauma System.
3. The August meeting will be primarily centered on the various legal issues surrounding the trauma system implementation. DHFS legal staff will be on hand to provide answers to previously submitted questions.
4. STAC approved the process for hospital designation site reviews.
5. Triage and Transport guidelines were once again brought forward as reminder that EMS services should have these protocols as part of their operational plan.
6. It was discussed at the STAC meeting the importance of the hospital receiving the EMS patient care report in a timely fashion so that important field information is not lost in the overall data collection process.
Legislative Issues: Dan Williams advised the Board.
1. Dan reported that 2005 Wisconsin Act 486 had been signed by the Governor. The bill provided basic changes to the Public Access defibrillation bill to allow for easier access and implementation for businesses and institutions.
State Office Issues:
1. Dan advised the Board that the WARDS data collection system is up and running and that he had sent out a reminder of that fact last week to all services which has sparked considerable interest.
2. Dan reported that the office had processed over 10,000 renewals to date with an anticipated big push at the end.
3. Dan advised the Board that there was a preliminary approval of the OJA grant which would provide significant funding for the support of disaster trailers place in strategic locations around Wisconsin. Actual funding and subsequent specific reward details will be negotiated in future meetings.
Old Business:
1. Chairperson, Steve Bane reported that the grant that would have sent him to a national meeting for teen driver awareness had not been approved so there will not be an opportunity to attend.
2. Chairperson, Steve Bane assigned the Policy and Practice committee to look into the issue of EMS services that are not leaving patient care reports at the hospitals in a timely fashion to look into administrative rule and suggest language changes that would tighten up the requirement.
New Business:
No new business was brought forward.
Other Board Related issues:
1. Chairperson Steve Bane reported that a special presentation would be made at the August 2, 2006 STAC meeting to Senator Ron Brown for his substantial contribution to the Trauma and EMS system. Steve encouraged everyone to attend the STAC meeting to show their support of Senator Brown.
2. Chairperson Bane offered congratulations to Dan Williams and the EMS Office Staff on the recent WEMSA Hot Sheet article that published the preliminary findings of survey that was conducted on efficiency of the State EMS Office showing significant improvement from a previous survey that was conducted in 2001.
3. Joe Covelli announced that an EMS colleague, Jamie Jaenke a Navy Medic had passed away in Iraq in the line of Duty. She was a member of the Ellsworth Area Ambulance and was licensed as an EMT-Intermediate. The Board offered their collective condolences.
Adjournment: Motion by Teesch, second by Haase, to adjourn. Motion carried. Meeting adjourned at 2:30 PM. .