East Baton Rouge Parish EMS Uses Cellular Broadband and WiFi to Improve Efficiencies and Business Decisions
Sierra Wireless Case Study | In-Vehicle Communications for Emergency Services
Client Background
Located in Southeastern Louisiana, the East Baton Rouge Parish Emergency Medical Services (EMS) is responsible for coordinating the dispatch, movement, and communications of all emergency support vehicles and mobile command posts within the parish. Real-time field connectivity and reporting is vital to saving lives.
Challenge Summary
- Capture more in-field emergency reporting and activity data
- Real-time connectivity for in-vehicle laptops, CAD systems, and WiFi hotspot data requirements
Solution Summary
Benefits Summary
- Secure, reliable connectivity for real-time reporting and access to critical CAD and information databases
- 4G and WiFi access point that transforms the vehicle into a mobile gateway to provide connections
to any WiFi enabled device - Plug-and-play installation and remote management of network of in-vehicle devices
- Mobile resource management for easy global or individual changes
- Improved data collection for reporting and business analysis
- Enhanced emergency response
Challenge Detail
Like most emergency medical organizations, East Baton Rouge Parish EMTs spend a great deal of time in their vehicles out in the community serving patients. The ability to both pull and push data from dispatch and medical facilities while on the road is critical for EMTs to more efficiently complete their duties, such as finding call locations, prepping medical staff for arriving patients, and logging activity reports.
“We recognized that our current process was not providing us with all the relevant data that was being collected on our routes. In order to make sound business decisions, we needed to collect and store as much data as possible in an efficient and timely manner,” explained Darryl Beard, EMS Planning & Research Manager at East Baton Rouge Parish EMS. Beard and his team were confident that mobile connectivity could solve its data access issue, provide the structure for automatic vehicle location (AVL), and perhaps even benefit other public service agencies in need of the same functionality.
Solution Detail
With the assistance of USAT Corporation, a Sierra Wireless partner and mobile back-haul specialist, East Baton Rouge Parish EMS selected the ultra-rugged Sierra Wireless AirLink MP70 in-vehicle router with Wi-Fi.
“We had been looking at other devices, and the AirLink MP was the one that satisfied both our functionality requirements and desired price point,” said Beard. Beard is also pleased with the service provided by USAT Corporation, which helped East Baton Rouge navigate through any issues that arose during initial deployment by working towards quick resolution and, when necessary, bringing in the proper parties to remove roadblocks.
“It’s great to work with a client who is very knowledgeable and professional,” commented USAT Corporation’s Melissa Reid, regional sales manager, regarding working with East Baton Rouge Parish EMS on its MP deployment. “They knew what they wanted, and we knew that we could meet their needs with an advanced, reliable solution in the AirLink product line - making the deployment as seamless as possible.”
East Baton Rouge Parish EMS is taking advantage of the MP’s advanced communications capabilities for several applications:
- Data collection – When a 911 dispatcher routes a call to EMS, call data from the CAD system gets pushed to a server using cellular broadband provided by the MP and is made available for paramedics to download onto one of two laptops located in each ambulance. Data includes address of call, nature of incident, time of dispatch, and more.
- Reporting – EMTs are often required to use 12-lead Electrocardiogram (EKG) machines to collect and monitor a patient’s heart activity during transport. The information is captured in an electronic report, which can be securely posted to a main database using cellular broadband communications.
- WiFi – The MP creates a Wi-Fi hotspot that allows EMTs to remove their laptops and continue wireless data transfer capabilities outside their vehicles. The parish EMS has also deployed the AirLink MP router in some of its special event trailers to create a Wi-Fi hotspot so that paramedic crews can pull and push incident data during the course of the event.
- AVL / mapping – Using the MP’s GPS host interface, East Baton Rouge Parish EMS has been able to implement a mapping application, tied into CAD, which allows dispatch to locate emergency vehicles within the parish and provide the most efficient route to the next destination.
- Mobile data – The parish EMS’ telemedicine program allows EMTs to identify high risk situations in the field for which captured EKG data can be forwarded to a medical facility using cellular broadband. This allows doctors to be properly prepared for a situation when it hits their doors; the faster the patient receives treatment, the greater his chances for survival.
Beard praised the AirLink Management Software (ALMS) for enabling him to make global changes to his fleet of MP in-vehicle routers by explaining, “A lot of things that we configure for wireless devices are going to be common over the entire fleet. Yet, we can also separate out particular items to change on particular devices, so management can be as universal or granular as we need.”
Project Results
“Adding the MP routers to our solution has shown a significant improvement in our ability to capture the data we need to work more efficiently and make better business decisions,” he continued. “We are capturing data on call trends, for medical uses, during a particular shift, or on a particular paramedic. We are also seeing supply usage based on time of year for advanced stocking, and we can see where the bulk and frequency of 911 calls are coming from to plan for future growth and substation placement.”
Contact USAT
USAT is a value-added reseller of Sierra Wireless IoT-enabled communications devices and networking software. USAT specializes in improving the efficiency of our clientele’s mission-critical operations by implementing wireless communication solutions for data acquisition. USAT provides, configures, and deploys durable, secure, and field-tested intelligent network devices to fit the exacting requirements and budgets of our clients' wireless connectivity initiatives.
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