Fort Worth’s emergency medical services has seen drops in response times and ambulance use after bringing those services in-house, but long hours and workload continue to make it difficult to recruit and retain EMTs, city officials said.
For the quarter through June, ambulance use dropped 28%, emergency travel times decreased 23.4%, and nonemergency travel times saw a 24% drop compared to the first quarter of fiscal year 2024, said James Horton, the city’s interim fire chief, during a meeting of the Fort Worth City Council’s public safety committee Tuesday.
Overall response time on emergency calls is down by approximately two minutes, and nonemergency calls are down approximately five minutes, Horton said. It’s been just over a year since the city moved EMS services into the fire department from MedStar.
“We do believe we’ve made great strides in system improvement and providing services to the citizens of Fort Worth,” Horton said.
The city’s goal for the new EMS branch was to respond to 90% of emergency calls in under 8 minutes. The new EMS fell short late last year at 11:09 minutes, but recently hit 8:55 between April and June, Horton said.
Through two recruiting classes in the last fiscal year, the fire department has hired and credentialed 114 EMTs and paramedics, but it has an attrition rate of 20% over the same period, having lost 85 employees, Horton said.
Of the 543 EMS staff positions as of July 1, only 507 are filled, or 93.4% staffed, leaving 36 vacancies. But Horton said the number of vacancies has risen to about 45 since. Thirty-three EMTs will start Oct. 1 to cover staffing until recruiting starts in the fall, Horton said.
The fire department is continuing to take steps to improve on long hours and workload.
It plans two EMS recruit classes in fiscal 2027, which begins Oct. 1. The department will recruit during the Texas EMS Conference in November and is participating in a new partnership with Tarrant County College on an in-house paramedics school that will start in January.
Council member Elizabeth Beck asked why the class starting Oct. 1 consists of only 25 recruits.
The department exhausted the previous waiting lists because some applicants were nearing the end of their eligibility, Horton said.
The department decided to start a new class in October rather than wait for the next round of entrance exams and interviews, which would not allow a new class to begin until May, he said.
Beck also questioned EMS work hours. The department in March changed from a schedule of seven 12-hour shifts over a 14-day period to shifts of 24 hours on duty and 48 hours off.
Those shifts have an average 56 hours per work week, with overtime.
The department plans to eventually change to shifts of 24 hours on duty and 72 hours off, which would take EMS to an average 42 hours per work week, a more common industry workload, according to Horton.
On July 1 last year, the city launched its in-house emergency medical services, moving from MedStar to the fire department, under an agreement with 14 other member cities, after deeming the MedStar model as financially unsustainable.
Kamal Morgan is a government accountability reporter for the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at kamal@fortworthreport.org.
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