Who
- Hospitals and emergency medical services (EMS) providers in Sacramento and Placer counties
- Sacramento County Emergency Medical Services Agency (SCEMSA)
What
At a public meeting on Feb. 8, the Sacramento County health officer committed the county to not pursuing financial penalties on hospitals for missing ambulance patient offload time (APOT) targets. This is to ensure a collaborative approach to APOT improvement.
The county hosted an APOT summit on Feb. 13 designed to unite hospital and EMS leaders and elevate best practices. The county is working with consultants to engage a neutral facilitator in guiding multi-stakeholder APOT improvement work through 2024 to bring about compliance with the newly enacted Assembly Bill 40.
Takeaway / Next Steps
Progress toward longstanding hospital objectives is continuing:
- SCEMSA created a Data Improvement Committee to ensure data fidelity of patient offload start and stop times.
- SCEMSA has an internal deadline of April 15 to submit its request to the state for permission to enact an alternative destination policy for substance use disorder and mental health cases. It also has one facility for each purpose lined up to receive those transports upon approval.