Greg Pulver, the operations manager for American Medical Response, works with AMR’s bariatric unit, which is used to transport obese patients. The ambulance uses a specially rigged gurney, a winch and a metal ramp system. The gurney is specially designed to support up to 800 pounds when raised to its normal height and 1,600 pounds when low to the ground.
First responders typically handle emergency calls with four people — two firefighters and two emergency medical technicians.
On Sunday, the Riverside Fire Authority had to call in extra help on four separate calls in Centralia. Four first responders weren’t enough to move the overweight and morbidly obese people they found stuck in uncompromising positions in their bathrooms or small dwellings’ tight spaces.
“It was an unusual day,” said Capt. Scott Snyder, noting that on Monday morning an extra firefighter had to be called in to help lift a man who was recumbent on his bathroom floor. “It took five sets of hands to lift him out.”
Centralia’s ambulance service, American Medical Response, has a special vehicle for such circumstances: the bariatric ambulance.
With a gurney that can hold a person weighing up to 1,600 pounds, the bariatric ambulance is split between Lewis and Thurston counties. It came into service last March.
“People aren’t getting any smaller,” said Greg Pulver, AMR’s operations manager for Lewis and Thurston counties, noting that the special ambulance is safer for patients and first responders.
In urgent cases the bariatric ambulance isn’t always available. And so a standard gurney, which can handle 500 pounds, is pushed to the max.
“And a lot of times that would cause the gurney to break,” Pulver said.
Snyder noted that the bariatric ambulance was needed for only one of the calls on Sunday.
On Monday, the bariatric ambulance was in service for two calls — transporting patients to different facilities.
The bariatric ambulance doesn’t look any different on the outside. But on the inside it’s equipped with a gurney that’s an extra 14 inches wide and a winch and steel cable. The $12,000 in modifications can safely rein in a 700-pound person.
Two ramps of eight feet in length are locked into place at the back of the ambulance. The gurney’s wheels are lined up with the ramps and a steel cable is attached. An electronic winch then pulls the gurney into the ambulance.
AMR’s first bariatric ambulance came to Seattle several years ago, according to Pulver, but now there are two in Seattle, one in Tacoma, one serving Lewis and Thurston counties and three in the Portland and Vancouver areas. There has been a noticeable increase in the need for the vehicle.
In fact, Providence Centralia Hospital added a bariatric suite earlier this year and bariatric gurneys and beds to its emergency department in 2010.
“This is one tool to better serve patients and ensure their safety,” Pulver said of the bariatric ambulance.
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Adam Pearson: (360) 807-8208
