Nova Scotia’s ambulance service says response times improving in 2024

CITYnews halifax / By The Canadian Press.

HALIFAX — The head of Nova Scotia’s ambulance service says response times have improved across the province since January.

Matthew Crossman, president of Emergency Medical Care Inc., told a legislative committee today that average response times are down from 36 minutes to 18 minutes provincewide.

Crossman says the improvement is mainly due to the use of air ambulance services and a program that frees up ambulances by allowing paramedics to discharge some patients at the scene of their treatment rather than taking them to hospital.

He says about a third of calls now result in patients being released instead of being taken to hospital.

Last September, provincial auditor general Kim Adair released a report showing the average wait time for an ambulance in 2022 had risen to 25 minutes from 14 minutes.

Adair’s report found that between 2017 and 2022, average response times had grown between two and five per cent annually.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.

The Canadian Press