Ambulances receive funding

ATLANTA --- When a state panel divvied up almost $59 million in state funding to help Georgia's beleaguered trauma-care system, hospitals that treat the most critically injured patients weren't the only ones getting assistance.

Almost $6.5 million went to providers of emergency transportation services, highlighting an often overlooked problem: how to get patients to trauma centers.

Ben Hinson, of the Georgia Trauma Care Network Commission and owner of Mid Georgia Ambulance Service, said the panel set aside funding to make sure trauma care centers could afford to have doctors and equipment ready for an emergency.

"Well, if there are no paramedics out there waiting to respond on a second's notice, you won't need the doctors," Mr. Hinson said.

Ambulances are a key part of efforts to make sure that every Georgian is within an hour of a trauma center, supporters say. Getting the state's trauma fatality rate down to the national average would save more than 700 lives a year, according to some estimates.

The trauma commission set aside about $1.5 million to help cover the emergency medical service bills of patients who can't pay.

Nearly $1 million is devoted to a program that would add GPS equipment to some ambulances, providing emergency coordinators with real-time information on where ambulances are.

And $4 million went to a grant program to help purchase new ambulances.