Rural residents are often forced to accept longer wait times for emergency services but the Municipal District of Willow Creek took extra steps to mitigate that risk for its residents, but those efforts have gotten tied up in red tape.

Four years ago, the M.D. used funds to purchase three emergency medical response units — fully equipped ambulances staffed by the same volunteers that run the region's fire halls. Each unit set the municipal district back about $135,000.

Those ambulances are now essentially being used as mobile first aid units instead of as the emergency transportation they had been intended for. It all stems from a dispute over the licensing agreement between the province's ruling body, Alberta Health and the Municipal District of Willow Creek.

"A lot of people say, 'Well if I have a heart attack, I might as well just sit down on the curb and die because no one is going to get to me for half an hour,'" said Earl Hemmaway, reeve of the M.D.

It's a sentiment he wishes he could disagree with.

Ambulances are shared resources

Travis Coleman is the manager of the M.D.'s emergency services and illustrates the problem using a hypothetical family of four who get into a car accident on Highway 2 on a Saturday.

Claresholm, located within the municipal district's boundaries, currently only has one Alberta Health Services ambulance staffed on evenings and weekends, he says.

It seems like when you mention rural Alberta to this particular government that they don't know anyone is out there, or something. I'm not sure because we don't hear back. - Earl Hemmaway, Reeve of the M.D. of Willow Creek

If an accident with four people occurred, the AHS ambulance — only able to carry one individual at a time — is forced to make the trip back and forth to the hospital, or call in ambulances from neighbouring towns. But if the latter option is chosen, it leaves the neighbouring towns without resources.

Conversely, sometimes Claresholm resources are pulled away to other places, leaving the nearest ambulance to come from as far away as Pincher Creek, 85 kilometres down the road.

The median response time for all rural areas in the province is just under 20 minutes, according to AHS's publicly posted statistics.

"When AHS is in town, they're great. But it's the [times] when the ambulances are out of town, where we need to get there, we need to get the patient to the hospital as quickly as we can," says Coleman.

Coleman and his team of volunteers staff their units and respond to all calls where an AHS ambulance is 10 minutes away, or further. But all they can do is administer basic care to patients until the AHS unit arrives, the MD units are not permitted to transport patients.

So what's the problem?

The units the municipality purchased are staffed by volunteers so the municipal district has stipulated those units can't be used to transfer non-urgent patients from one hospital to another.

Coleman says this is a sticking point for AHS when it comes to licensing the M.D.'s units as ambulances, capable of transporting urgent cases.

"We recognize that the municipality wants its emergency medical response units licensed for patient transport," a spokesperson for Alberta Health said in a statement to CBC News.

"When it comes to these licensing decisions, Alberta Health's top priority is always patient, practitioner and public safety, and we have a clearly defined licensing process for ambulances to ensure the highest standards are in place."

The M.D. of Willow Creek is 4,558 square km. in southern Alberta, just northwest of Lethbridge. The population is in excess of 5,500 people. (Google Maps)

This problem wasn't always so, for a year-and-a-half, Alberta Health allowed the M.D. medical units to transport patients in the most urgent circumstances in a pilot project format. But when it ended, so too did their privileges.

"Ultimately, with the pilot project it was nice because we were able to transport at times when we had patients that weren't doing very well. We could get them to the hospital in a timely fashion, to get them to the doctors and the nurses they needed to be with. Instead of waiting the 25, 30 minutes at times for the incoming ambulance," Coleman says.

The three units respond from their stations in Fort Macleod, Claresholm and Nanton, Alta.

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"It is frustrating that they are not being used for what they were originally bought for. We bought them to have a better response time for our rate payers, and to have our rate payers taken care of," Hemmaway says.

While both Hemmaway and Coleman expressed frustration, they also had a willingness to work with the province to come to some sort of negotiation, but that doesn't seem to be on the table, according to Hemmaway.

"It would be nice to hear back from the government, and have some concern for rural Alberta. It seems like when you mention rural Alberta to this particular government that they don't know anyone is out there, or something. I'm not sure because we don't hear back."