COVID-19 ResourcesKEMSA has been working closely with national, state, and local partners to navigate guidance and resources for the COVID-19 response. Below are resources, documents, and links that may be useful to your agency. Please remember things change quickly and all treatment guidelines and/or protocols would need to be approved at your local level. We will continue to add resources here instead of sending out emails for every resource added. |
Kansas Department of Health and Environment announced that a weekly vaccine update will be published on its website every Wednesday by 5 p.m. This week’s copy can be found at: www.coronavirus.kdheks.gov/DocumentCenter/View/1664/COVID-19-Vaccine-Updates-1292020-.
COVID-19 Vaccination Considerations for Paramedics
KEMSA has received an official statement from KPERS that clarifies the 1000 hour restriction on part-time employees and the use of previously retired KPER / KP&F personnel. The documents appear to provide guidance that will allow the use of such staff during the currently declared emergency beyond their normal restrictions.
KEMSA offers no legal guidance on the attached documents. Each agency should present the attached information to their own Human Resource staff for interpretation and implementation.
We hope this will provide some additional staffing options to agencies during this challenging time.
KEMSA sent out a survey the week of Nov. 16 to service directors to assess how the COVID surge is impacting Kansas EMS. 85 EMS agencies responded to the survey and below are some of the more concerning issues identified.
KEMSA is reaching out to help find solutions and this survey will help to bring awareness to our current situation. The full results of the survey can be found at the link on the bottom of this note.
Summary:
Detailed survey results: https://kemsa.org/resources/Documents/COVID-19/COVIDSurge_Results_11.20.20.pdf
HSS Notice - Re: Additional details for providers that received one or more payments from the Provider Relief Fund (PRF) totaling at least $10,000 (9/19/20)
EMS COVID RESOURCE REPORTING TOOL - https://nemsis.org/ems-covid-resource-reporting-tool/
SERVICE DIRECTORS - Please: Take 3-5 minutes each Monday to complete this tool.
Each day over the past several months, I have been involved in multiple state and federal meetings regarding COVID and COVID response. What I quickly learned is that when it comes to reporting information on PPE availability, personnel shortages, and workforce impacts, there is no shortage of national level information regarding nursing, long-term care facilities, and hospitals, but next to nothing on assessments of and impacts to EMS.
NHTSA’s Office of EMS and the NEMSIS-TAC saw the same concerns and found a way to change that in a similar fashion to how these other entities are reporting their information (providing an apples-to-apples comparison) and have it specific to EMS.
I am happy to present to you their creation: the EMS COVID RESOURCE REPORTING TOOL. And although it does have COVID in the title, we fully expect this to become utilized during the impending influenza season as well.
By filling out the report, you are helping us provide a current and accurate assessment of Kansas EMS on PPE availability and “stress” (personnel shortages and EMS workforce impacts - numbers, no names) your agency may be experiencing. This will be shared with KDEM during this response and will allow us to focus state level resources into areas of need. Completing this will also help bring EMS officially to the federal table and identify local resource status and needs to help focus federal assistance and federal assistance programs – this is a huge step forward for EMS nationally.
I know that you may be reporting similar information to your local county emergency manager each week or two for their reporting/request process and some of you are reporting similar data to HHS TeleTrack. This is not meant to replace that. The only difference here is that this will be solely EMS related and is a direct link to us, as the State, and to Federal officials. NEMSIS-TAC has done their best in placing logic into their tool to streamline data entry and limit the time involved.
We would anticipate this tool growing slightly down the road to assess for needle and syringe capacity when a vaccination becomes available.
Please review the two documents below and please strongly consider taking that short time each Monday to complete the tool available through the NEMSIS website. I would love to see 100% participation on next week’s report. We will be pushing this tool out to the Emergency Medical Response Agencies as well and feel free to forward this to those agencies within your area as well.
Let’s put Kansas at the lead on this! Let me know if you have any questions.
Jospeh HouseExecutive Director, Kansas Board of EMS
General Links/Resources
Kansas Resources
CDC Links
N95 Resources - Usage/Re-Use
CMS & COVID-19
Webinars/Trainings
Documents
Helping Our OwnThis is a stressful time for first responders. If you know of someone who needs help or would like more information about helping your own, please reach out to KEMSA's peer support society for resources. KEMSA Peer Support Society Mental Health Resources: | Advocacy - Kansas
Advocacy - National
CARES Act Grant/Stimulus Updates
News Updates
From EMS Services:The documents below can include, but aren't limited to: COVID -19 specific protocols, policies, COOP plans, and more that might be helpful to others. If you would like to share your items, please send them to Mary Napier. *Disclaimer: Each agency must verify the practices listed comply with current recommendations from KDHE. Remember things are changing rapidly. Consulting resource for services or health departments: Reno County EMS Documents (3/27/20)
Butler County EMS Documents
Sedgwick County EMS Documents
Other Resources
Midwest Medical in Wichita and Scott City are available for assistance with transports. |