Thank God doctor Scalea is a genuine human being and not a politician. I have been involved with EMS for over 21 Years. I am a paramedic, my father is a paramedic and my mother was an EMT. I have been around EMS my entire life. I also teach EMS. The fact that some people get flown when they shouldnt is true. The fact that more than 50% of patients brought to Shock Trauma leave within 24 hours is true. Those numbers can be looked at from many angles and many conclusion can be made. Many people complain at the high number of people leaving with 24 hours, I say do some real research and read the reports from field, the paramedics of the helicopter as well as the hospital documentation before someone criticizes, get the big picture not just a snap-shot. My wife and I have a friend who was involved in a head-on MVC. She was unconscious on the scene and did not wake up until she was in the CAT Scan machine at Shock Trauma.Thank God all she had was a severe concusion, she left Shock Trauma within 24 hrs. Should she have been flown? The answer is absolutely YES! Her Mechanism of Injury as well as her condition clearly indicted a higher level of treatment than the local hospital could provide. She is one of those statistics, she is alive and well. Thank God for the EMTs, Paramedics, Maryland State Police helicopter crew and the staff at Shock Trauma.Maryland has one of the best systems in the WORLD, people come from many parts of the world to study our system, that says something. Can things be done better? Yes! The system however as we know it works pretty darn good. The new Medevac policy is not needed and unwarranted. This policy will only do harm by delaying a vital link in the Maryland EMS system. The crash that killed four was absolutely tragic, and I only hope thay are looking down and are saying hey guys keep doing what we have been doing because its the right thing. 140 million is alot of money to spend to replace the helicopters, but its the price of doing business the right way.

It saddens me to hear that it took the crash of a MSP bird, and the deaths of 4 individuals to get someone to look at the flight policies of the MSP. Having been an ALS provider for almost 15 years, in Western NY, and affiliated in MD Ive seen how different areas setup flight ops. Its my opinion that in MD, far too many patients are being flown. Patients who require flights are in need of ALS care, or require other special services due to prolonged transport time, extended extrication, advanced specialist care ie burn center, or other such care, NOT just because a BLS provider needs ALS, there are ground units for that.

The question Im left to ask is was this flight necessary, and if it was, why upon the decision by the flight crew to abort the flight and divert back to Andrews would they request BLS transport for their two patients to continue to the hospital. Wouldnt the use of a chopper necessitate the need for ALS ground transport. You have to be left to wonder as we will never know why that decision was made.

Dont get my wrong, Im all for necessary helicopter operations, and Ive witnessed many a life saved by quick action from a flight crew, however, having cut my teeth in an area that had only 1 bird for the better part of 4 western NY counties, you made damn sure that your patient needed it before you called. You didnt call just because they were available, you had a serious justification to require using the only bird in the region.

We should grieve for our brothers, and honor them, and take a hard look at the ops policies and do whatever possible to reduce the risk to our crews, and our patients.

Has ANYONE in Maryland EMS read any of the studies destroying MOI as a valid decision tool?

The fact that Marylands EMS is still so stuck in the dark ages tells me they have no idea when they need a helicopter and when they dont, so they just default to calling more often than not.

So their insistence on the "need" to have so many helicopter transports should be taken with enough salt to kill the Pacific Ocean.