One of the first questions you’ll ask after launching a community paramedicine program is this: How do we keep it going in the long term? That’s what we’ll discuss today. How you can develop a sustainable community paramedicine program.
To build a sustainable community paramedic program, you’ll have to assess the needs of your area, deliver highly efficient services, and maintain strong connections. Building a sustainable community paramedic program is similar to building a good business. Yes, the end goals are somewhat different, but the mechanics of the process are very similar.
If there is one word that can describe the key to succeeding at anything it’s this: persistence. And, as you persist, it helps to dig into the details, so let’s do that now.
Steps to Creating a Sustainable MIH-CP Program
If there’s one point to get across it’s this: the path to developing a sustainable and successful program in your area might look very different from developing a sustainable MIH-CP in another area. This is just the nature of a highly nuanced field. With that said, there are some specific steps you can take to cultivate long-term success for your community paramedic program.
The steps to develop a sustainable community paramedicine program:
- Start off in the right direction
- Grants – start with a financial boost
- Take a community-based approach to funding
- Develop a strong service
- Build Symbiotic Partnerships (EMS or Hospital)
- Continue to build connections
In the next sections, we’ll break down what each of these “sustainability steps” means, and outline some of their nuances.
Sustain a Community Paramedicine by Starting in the Right Direction
Sometimes, health teams give good services to the wrong people. To sustain a community paramedicine program, you need to ensure that your team is targeting the right problems. Let’s use a restaurant as an example.
Let’s say that you have a restaurant that makes the best beef burgers in town. You know that people will love them. You place the restaurant in a prime location, and you wait for your customers. But no one shows up. After some time, you start asking around. Why won’t people buy my burgers? Finally, someone tells you: “I guess you’re not from around here. We’re all vegetarians!”
In this case, the restaurant failed – not because they didn’t offer a good product, but because they failed to perform research on the community. Yes, they can pivot to offer veggie burgers, but they’ll have to restructure their entire approach.
The same thing can happen in community paramedicine. You might be excited to deliver a program that will combat substance abuse; however, it could be the community really needs assistance with chronic diseases.
The takeaway is this: be sure to perform a community health assessment, aiming your MIH-CP services right at the heart of a community’s healthcare needs.
Start with a Financial Boost (Grants)
A rocket needs powerful engines and fuel to break out of earth’s atmosphere, but once they do it’s smoother sailing. A grant can give you the rocket fuel to succeed in the beginning, allowing you to stabilize your revenue stream later on.
Some states offer grants to community paramedicine programs. Grants can be an especially good option for programs that simply don’t have a lot of extra cash lying around, as is the case with smaller services or rural areas.
If you want a whole breakdown of the process, read this guide on how to find a grant for your MIH-CP program.
Consider a Community Approach (Taxes)
In some areas, a community paramedic program’s services will appeal to the entire city, township, or county. Perhaps your program offers non-transport services for common illnesses, and everyone who needs the service has access.
Or maybe you have a program that facilitates telemedicine appointments with a physician. In these instances, the community might be willing to provide a tax stipend toward the program. Now, it can certainly be tricky to convince people to pay more taxes (or to allocate tax money from some other service), so it’s imperative that you heed step one.
You really need to have your hand on the pulse of the community, and you need to ensure that your services will resonate with their needs.
Now let’s talk about one of the most important aspects of developing a long-term community paramedic program.
Hone the Community Paramedicine Program’s Services
Let’s go back to the restaurant analogy. Your restaurant has a great building and the best location, but if the food and service are bad, then nobody will come. This is a good point to remember when working towards a sustainable community paramedicine program.
Yes, there are some serious differences between a restaurant and an MIH-CP program, but that doesn’t mean that providers should overlook the importance of running a quality program that makes a real difference. If you can think outside the box and stretch yourself to meet the needs of the community, then you can generate a lot of organic excitement for the program.
Just have a look at the program in Crawfordsville Indiana. This community paramedicine unit garnered national attention, with interviews on NBC. By providing a great service (that was willing to be versatile and take an honest look at their local needs), they brought pride to their community, and the chance to increase longevity.
Integrate the Program with an Established Organization
Another common way to build a sustainable community paramedicine program is to operate the program as a branch of a successful organization. For example, many MIH-CP programs start as an extension of an ambulance service.
In these types of systems, the community paramedicine program doesn’t operate under a “do or die” premise, rather the services can be scaled to balance with the financial needs of the community. This type of partnership allows the core organization to test the benefits of the program.
In some cases, a hospital might choose to launch a community paramedicine program in the hope of reducing frequent hospital readmissions. In other cases, a local clinic in a rural area might launch the program to extend its reach and reduce the load on the in-person clinic.
If you’re planning to start a community paramedicine program as a sole entity, then you will need to make many connections in advance. As it stands, it isn’t common for a community paramedicine program to operate without a close tie to a more established health organization.
Now let’s discuss the most important aspect of developing a sustainable community paramedicine program.
Learn to Establish Connections Within the Program
Establishing connections with local organizations is probably the best way to build a sustainable community paramedicine program. Why are connections so important? Well, let’s return (for a final time) to the restaurant example.
Let’s say you open that restaurant, and it’s doing pretty well. However, you only have one item on the menu. While there might be some folks interested in this one item, there will be many who want something different. And, even those who liked your food will probably become bored and want more variety. To keep the restaurant going, you’ll need to add more dishes to the menu!
The same thing can happen with a community paramedic program. You’re doing well, you’re offering a good service, the people are happy – but times change, and new needs emerge. You need to adapt.
Building connections with others helps you adapt to change, making you resilient to hard times and helping you flourish during the good times. When you build connections, you’re adding items (services) to the menu.
When you build a connection with a mental health institution you can reach out to people struggling with psychological illness. When you build a connection with a local rehab facility, you can reach those who struggle with addiction. When you build a connection with the local primary care physician, you can help those with chronic diseases.
At the end of the day, these connections are essential. Why? Because we all know that a patient doesn’t have isolated problems. Many of them struggle with addiction, and chronic illness, and mental health issues. By forming connections with experts in these fields, you make yourself more capable of treating a myriad of ailments, and more likely to make it in the long run.
The Next Step Toward a Sustainable Mobile Integrated Health-Community Paramedicine Program
Developing a sustainable community paramedicine program is all about starting out on the right foot, ensuring you offer stellar service, and continuing to build and foster connections in the community. How do you accomplish all these goals?
You start off on the right foot by performing a details community health assessment. You ensure stellar service by offering intuitive programs and providing EMTs and paramedics with the training they need. Finally, you continue to build relationships in the community, listening to the questions and concerns of your stakeholders and working hard to alleviate their pain points.
One of the key aspects of building connections is maintaining connections. You want your partners to feel respected and heard. Contact Julota to learn how their integrated MIH-CP software programs can help you build partnerships, ensure good collaboration in the field, and maintain connections for many years down the road.