Bridging the health care gap

Eric Livingston, left, is one of the five community paramedics under Abbeville’s pioneering initiative. Dr. Keith Scott is the program’s medical control physician. (Frank Bumb | Index-Journal)

ABBEVILLE – A new, cutting-edge initiative has Abbeville County paramedics rethinking how they provide assistance to area residents.
Spearheaded by Emergency Management Director David Porter, the program has paramedics evolving into community paramedics.
“They’re not doing anything that a paramedic isn’t currently licensed to do in South Carolina,” Porter said. “But they are doing things that paramedics have not traditionally done. So they are doing an expanded role.”
While Porter played down the transition for his paramedics, the program is the first of its kind in South Carolina. Mary Margaret Jackson, chief quality and risk officer for the Abbeville Area Medical Center, said the program represents a radical shift in thinking for health care.

“We can’t sit on our laurels anymore and wait on patients to come and see us and take care of them and then dismiss them from the building and that’s all we do,” Jackson said.
That expanded role is a focus on preventative care, emphasizing in-home visits for people battling chronic illnesses such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), congestive heart failure, high blood pressure and diabetes.
Funded through a $25,000 grant from the South Carolina Office of Rural Health and a $153,000 grant from the Duke Endowment, the program shifts paramedics into a preventative – instead of reactive – force.
“The goal isn’t to prevent that 911 call,” Porter said. “It’s to prevent the traumatic event that leads to that call, especially with chronic illnesses where education can play a role.”

Bridging the health care gap

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