Response and Fact Check: Minister of Health’s October 16 letter on Ambulance Dispatch
Consolidation
On October 16, 2020, Minister of Health Tyler Shandro wrote a letter to the Mayors of Lethbridge,
Calgary, Red Deer and the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo, notifying them he rejected local
concerns regarding consolidated ambulance dispatch.
Municipalities are faster
The Minister of Health stated: “the plain fact is that dispatch and overall response times are similar across
the province – and within AHS’ targets – in the four cities that dispatch ambulances and in those that are
dispatched by AHS. There is no reason to expect response times to change.”
Fact: The four municipalities dispatch their ambulances faster than AHS, and AHS doesn’t always meet
their own standard.

History of dispatch
The Minister of Health stated: "There are clear benefits to this decision, as outlined in previous studies done
by the Health Quality Council of Alberta ("HQCA") as well as EY. All of those documents are public."
Fact: the previous Ministers of Health in 2013 (Fred Horne) and 2016 (Sara Hoffman) read the HQCA
report and overturned AHS once they saw the local data. The EY report only looked at the dollars
saved from a unilateral and not holistic perspective. It did not review patient outcomes, consult with
the municipalities delivering the service, or identify how slow AHS is at dispatching an ambulance. The
EY report referenced dollars saved that had been previously identified in other AHS reports but did
not do an independent financial audit or consider economic impacts to municipalities. The Minister of
Health has not provided any data to show the benefits of the AHS dispatch centres consolidated
dispatch model.
Patient care
The Minister of Health stated: "A province-wide EMS dispatch system will improve patient care through more
efficient coordination of all EMS resources, which allows EMS to send the closest available ambulance to a
patient regardless of geographic boundaries."

Box 5008, Red Deer, AB T4N 3T4
www.reddeer.ca

 Fact: AHS will only see and send the available ambulances, not the closest emergency vehicle, such as
a fire unit. A municipal dispatcher will see both fire and EMS and dispatch the fire vehicle when closer.
In some cases, this could cause delays of up to multiple hours in remote areas such as Wood Buffalo,
where the next closest ambulance is 3.5 hours away.
Reeve Lorne Hickey, Chairperson for Mayors & Reeves of Southwest Alberta (who were part of the
previous consolidation) stated, "The plan to consolidate EMS dispatch to a centralized system has been
fraught with problems and poor service to Albertans."
Minister of Health stated: "And the fact is, there's no advantage in response times from leaving dispatch with
the cities, considering the performance of the EMS system in working with multiple other emergency response
agencies across the province where dispatch has already been integrated."
Fact: Municipalities dispatch an ambulance between 18-21 seconds faster than AHS, and our
dispatchers know local geography. Chair Suzanne Oel, Foothills Regional Emergency Services
Commission Chairperson (who were part of the previous consolidation), stated, "The fragmented
dispatch has resulted in lengthy response times and gaps in coverage due to poor rural area familiarization."
Savings
Minister of Health stated: "It will result in savings of several million dollars a year, but not one dollar will be
removed from the EMS budget."
Fact: The EY report stated the savings would be $5 million. In the October 16th letter to the Editor in
the Calgary Herald, the Minister said there would be $6 million in savings; now it's $7 million in savings.
Municipalities have been sending fire medics to medical calls at no charge to AHS for 9 years. In 2019,
our four regions subsidized AHS ambulances up to $12.35 million at no cost to AHS.
The potential savings at AHS has not been publically vetted. However, any efficiencies gained at AHS
are coming at the expense of creating inefficiencies in municipalities. Example: This transition will
create an estimated $5M inefficiency in the integrated Fire/EMS system in Lethbridge.

Box 5008, Red Deer, AB T4N 3T4
www.reddeer.ca