A new Kansas law requiring 116 hours of continuing education every two years for first responders and emergency medical technicians may mean “we’ll lose some of them,” Jason Nelson, Allen County ambulance director, told county commissioners Tuesday.
He said the law was a hot topic at a training session for instructors in Parsons last weekend.
“We’re going to try to get legislators to change the law,” when the 2011 session starts in early January, Nelson said. “It isn’t very workable the way it is because a lot of first responders and EMTs have full-time jobs and are volunteers. It would be difficult for them to find time to get in that many hours of training.”
Kansas has about 10,000 medical technicians, including 6,000 paramedics not affected by the continuing education law.
Nelson said he thought it was be a major issue in western Kansas, where many ambulance services depend on volunteers.
“Some estimates are that as many as 2,000 may quit,” he said.
Iola and Allen County ambulances are manned by full-time employees.
NELSON said county ambulances had made 930 runs through Tuesday morning, 117 more than in 2009.
“We had a relatively quiet weekend,” he said, “but overall we’ve been busy this year.”
