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Medical chopper bypasses heliport
The LifeFlight aircraft is based in Evergreen and took approximately 43 minutes to reach CCHS. The patient was to be transported to Providence Hospital in Mobile. Her name or condition was not available from first responders. Why did the helicopter not land at S. T. Hollins Heliport at Grove Hill Memorial Hospital? Roy Waite, county Emergency Management Agency director, said Jets had selected the site for the helicopter to land. Doug Sewell, hospital administrator, had not been contacted regarding the helicopter landing. "EMTALA (Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act) rules do say once you are anywhere on our grounds, you are an emergency patient of ours," Sewell said. "We would have to have some responsibility for the patient." According to the web site emtala.com, "the avowed purpose of the statute is to prevent hospitals from rejecting patients, refusing to treat them, or transferring them to 'charity hospitals' or
Sewell thought arrangements had already been worked out where area emergency personnel could use the heliport. "If it is safer for them to land here on our pad, I have no problem with them bringing a patient here and waiting for that patient to fly out of here," he said. There is an exception to the COBRA (Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconcil-iation Act) or EMTALA rules if the heliport is just used for transportation, Waite said. In a statement from Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services provided by Waite, "helicopters and ambulances entering hospital grounds for the sole purpose of conveying a patient from or to another hospital do not trigger EMTALA obligations for the hospital owning the landing pad unless the ambulance or helicopter crew requests assistance with the medical management of a patient." Waite said later Monday morning that officials with the EMA, hospital and ambulance service will meet in the coming weeks to clear the way for the hospital heliport to be available. It's a communication problem, he said.
There are also designated spots in the county for aircraft to land, and some first responders need to be made aware of them, Waite said.
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