Gabriola ambulance station moved to full-time

Sounder News

Ambulance stations in 16 communities on Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands are moving to what Island Health and the Ministry of Health say are improved paramedic staffing models, to enhance 911 responsiveness and provide consistent and reliable out-of-hospital care.

Adrian Dix, Minister of Health announced this past week that on April 1, 2024, 60 ambulance stations were converted across the province to more effective service delivery models – each model chosen to reflect the unique needs of those communities.

Dix said this will provide more equitable access to care for people living in rural and remote communities, and better compensation and work environments for paramedics, particularly those who already live and work in these communities and provide emergency medical care to neighbours and community members.

In 2021, 16 stations in communities in the Island Health region transitioned to the “scheduled on-call” (SOC) model. This past week, all 16 of those stations converted from SOC to one of three models.

Three communities including Gabriola, Gold River, and Quadra Island were upgraded to 24/7 full-time “alpha” ambulance stations on April 1, 2024. Under this model, each station has 8 full-time regularly-scheduled positions, as well as two additional irregular full-time positions. They will work 12-hour shifts, and stations will have staff on duty 24 hours a day.

BC EHS confirmed last fall that after April 1, Gabriola will continue to have a second ambulance staffed under the Kilo model, where paramedics are paid to be on-call, wearing a pager, responding to the station if paged by BC EHS dispatch.

This second ambulance is staffed based on availability of members. When staffing numbers permit, Gabriola will have two ambulances available to respond to emergencies.

Twelve other communities are moving to a new “mix shift” staffing model. The mix shift model has staff on duty in the station twice as often as they do with the SOC model, with 16 hours in station on duty and 8 hours on call (pager) at night.

The community of Zeballos is also benefiting from a new full-time paramedic unit chief position, while the ambulance is staffed using the on-call “kilo” model.

Ambulance Paramedics of BC president, Jason Jackson said, “The April 1 conversions are an important change in how we provide paramedic services in these 60 communities,” said. Patient care is the most important thing to us, and this new approach helps us better recruit and retain paramedics to work in these smaller communities, improve how we respond to 911 calls, and most importantly, help paramedics provide better care to our patients.”

Provincewide, the conversion from SOC to three other models means 281 full-time and 200 regular part-time positions, representing a total full-time equivalent of 432 positions, 245.95 of which are net new positions.