Emergency Medical Services

Albuquerque has a two-tier EMS system—with a private contractor providing transportation to area hospitals. AFD fire fighters provide the first-tier of the emergency response, including scene control, patient assessment, and stabilization treatment in anticipation of transportation.
Nineteen engine companies, five ladder companies, and two hazardous materials response units provide basic life support while thirteen transport-capable rescue units provide advanced life support to the community.

AFD staffing levels include 424 basic emergency medical technicians and 112 paramedics. Basic life support companies are equipped with semi-automatic defibrillators for rapid electrical therapy delivery to those cardiac patients that require it. Advanced life support rescue companies follow written protocols as set by the Albuquerque/Bernalillo County Medical Control Board.

Medical direction is furnished by a contract vendor that provides a physician, who is board-certified in emergency medicine, for guidance and direction on all medical issues. The Medical Director works closely with the EMS Division Commander to assure quality patient care through the evaluation and review of the entire EMS system.

EMS Quality Improvement is accomplished through the Quality Improvement (QI) office, under the direction of a Captain serving as the QI officer. A paramedic Captain is assigned to each of the three shifts in order to provide a round-the-clock resource to field personnel for EMS issues.

EMS training is coordinated through the Training and Safety Division by a Captain assigned as the EMS training coordinator, under the direction of the Division Commander for Training and Safety. Various types of training include the initial EMT-basic curriculum, basic and paramedic refreshers, continuing education, and other specialized training such as advanced cardiac life support, pediatric advanced life support, and pre-hospital trauma life support. Initial paramedic training is also provided at the Albuquerque Fire Academy under the training umbrella of the University of New Mexico School of Medicine.

In 1998, the Albuquerque Fire Department provided more than 43,725 EMS responses. The average geographic response area per rescue response zone is 12.5 square miles, with an average response time to critical priority calls of 4 minutes, 44 seconds.

The department has established target thresholds as an assessment of response time reliability to EMS calls. The targets are to meet BLS requests in less than six minutes, and to meet ALS requests in less than eight minutes - on 90% of all calls. The most recent analysis of monthly calls data shows BLS percent reliability to be 87.6%, and ALS percent reliability as 95.2%. These times exceed national accreditation standards.

The Communications Dispatch Center utilizes Clawson Medical Priority Dispatch to prioritize calls, determine response configurations, and to provide pre-arrival instruction to callers.