BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 1223
Page 1
Date of Hearing: May 20, 2015
ASSEMBLY COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Jimmy Gomez, Chair
AB
1223 (O'Donnell) - As Amended May 14, 2015
-----------------------------------------------------------------
|Policy |Health |Vote:|19 - 0 |
|Committee: | | | |
| | | | |
| | | | |
|-------------+-------------------------------+-----+-------------|
| | | | |
| | | | |
| | | | |
|-------------+-------------------------------+-----+-------------|
| | | | |
| | | | |
| | | | |
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Urgency: No State Mandated Local Program: NoReimbursable: No
SUMMARY:
This bill requires the Emergency Medical Services Authority
(EMSA) to adopt a statewide standard methodology for the
calculation and reporting by a local EMS agency of ambulance
patient offload time, as defined. It also authorizes a local
EMS agency to adopt policies and procedures for calculating and
AB 1223
Page 2
reporting ambulance patient offload time, and requires the LEMSA
to use the standard definition if it chooses to adopt such
policies and procedures.
FISCAL EFFECT:
Minor and absorbable costs to EMSA (GF or federal grant funds).
COMMENTS:
1)Purpose. The author cites significant delays for first
responders delivering patients to emergency departments.
Collecting standardized data is an important step to
quantifying and addressing the program.
2)Support. The California Fire Chiefs Association (CFCA),
sponsor of this bill writes in support that current law
requires EMS providers, when responding to 9-1-1 calls, to
deliver their patients to licensed EDs. CFCA states that
patients suffering from serious medical conditions and those
with only minor issues go through the same process and are
delivered to the same type of facility; at the same time EDs
are busier than ever, this means that EMS responders are
spending more time waiting to offload patients at EDs and this
bill seeks to help alleviate this problem by requiring the
adoption of a methodology to keep track of wait times.
3)Opposition. There was significant opposition to a prior
version of this bill, but entities opposed have almost
entirely removed their opposition with the latest set of
amendments. No opposition is verified at this time, based on
recent amendments.
AB 1223
Page 3
Analysis Prepared by:Lisa Murawski / APPR. / (916)
319-2081