Public perceptions of a rural emergency medical services system.

Abstract

To determine the awareness of citizens and physicians concerning the capabilities of a rural emergency medical services (EMS) system. Citizens and physicians are unaware of the capabilities of the EMS system. Residents were selected randomly from the local telephone directory and asked a series of structured questions about their EMS agency. A written survey was distributed to area physicians. Chi-square analysis was used to compare the proportion of respondents who knew the available interventions in their community with the proportion of those who did not. Statistical significance was inferred at p < 0.01. A total of 49% of the citizens were able to identify available skills, and 41.4% of the physicians were able to identify available skills. Physicians were less likely than were the citizens to be able to identify the skills performed by each provider (p < 0.001). This study indicates that both physicians and the lay public have little understanding of the capabilities of their EMS system.