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HUTCHINSON, Kan. – The new Reno County EMS Chief, Terry David was before the Reno County Commission Tuesday where he gave some numbers for the responses that Reno County EMS has made so far this year.

According to the numbers he released showed a pretty good increase to the number of calls made in third quarter when compared to the two previous quarters.

It shows that in the third quarter they had 1,625 EMS responses compared with 1,439 in the second quarter and 1,485 in the first. Now not all of those calls resulted in a patient being transported.

David compared to number of calls in the third quarter of this year compared to the same period last year saying they saw an increase of 8.4 percent, but the number of patients actually being transported was down 1.2 percent.

He also noted that EMS operated with a deficit for the third quarter which is $108,951 over budget. He says contributing that budget deficit were revenues that were over $45,000 under budget and reimbursement discounts and adjustments that were $63,848 over budget. For that quarter, bad debts totaled just over $9,000 and adjustments to Medicare is $33,114 and Medicaid of $21,555 accounted for the majority of the adjustments.

For 2016 EMS total is $210,549 under budget and to date, no funds for capital equipment have been used. But, he says that will change this month when they will take delivery of a remounted ambulance at a cost of $125,925.

He says since he took over the EMS services, they have hired eight people including three new paramedics. He says this should help alleviate some of the fatigue of staff because of having to work long hours.