Community Paramedicine Evaluation Tool Released

The Health Resources and Services Administration Office of Rural Health Policy (ORHP) has released the 2012 Community Paramedicine Evaluation Tool. Community Paramedicine is an emerging field in health care where EMS professionals operate in expanded roles to provide health care services where access to physicians, clinics, and/or hospitals may be difficult. There has been increasing interest in and movement towards the implementation of such programs, particularly across rural America.

This document stresses the need for each Community Paramedicine program to define its system-specific health status benchmarks and performance indicators and to use a variety of community health and public health interventions to improve the community’s health status. Together with experts from around the country, NHTSA’s Office of EMS contributed to the development of this valuable evaluation tool.

The Community Paramedicine Evaluation Tool can be found on the ORHP website. Please contact Megan Meacham if you have any questions about this resource.