Bastrop County ESD #3 Commissioners approved a staff recommendation to increase the ambulance deployment on the busiest days of the week.   Starting in June, the District provided funding to increase from four 24-hour ambulances to five 24-hour ambulances plus two 12-hour ambulances seven days a week.   The deployment also includes a 24-hour clinical supervisor.  These changes were designed to decrease response times and address the growing call volume in the county.

Beginning November 7th, an additional ambulance will be staffed 12 hours per day, four days a week.  According to Director of Data Analytics and Performance Improvement Ernesto Rodriguez, “demand for ambulances is not uniform throughout the day and varies by day of week. It is important to flex the deployment to address call volume variation throughout the week.”

The 48 additional unit hours per week will address recent surges seen before 9am.  The original two 12-hour ambulances covered 9a-9p and 11a-11p respectively.  The additional unit will cover 6:30a-6:30p.  “Acadian and the ESD were observing frequent early morning surges,” Rodriguez explained.  “This unit will help provide an early morning buffer and will continue to help throughout the day.”

Acadian was given the ability to flex the hours and days to address trends.   They are also considering reducing to one 12-hour unit on the slowest volume day and shifting those budgeted hours to further increase resources on the busiest day. 

The ESD and Acadian monitor volume and response time performance to life threatening calls on an ongoing basis.  The parties independently look at the data and then meet to compare observations and recommendations.  The District Board of Commissioners is willing to fund additional resources if its independent assessment supports such a move.  Rodriguez concluded, “following modern performance improvement techniques, we develop a hypothesis based on the data.  We make incremental changes and reassess.  We want to dial this in so that we meet the District’s goals in the most efficient way possible.”