EMS From 1960s To 1980s: Emergency Medical Services Have Come A Long Way

Back in the 1960s, when EMS was just getting started, no one had any idea that it would have developed into the numerous Mobile Intensive Care Units that they are today throughout the United States. According to the original white paper that was published, “Accidental Death and Disability: The Neglected Disease of Modern Society”,  deaths that were caused due to patients dying because of not being taken to a hospital in a timely manner. This caused a Veterans Administration Hospital in Alexandria, VA to open up an emergency medical services department. The early days were a  little more disorganized and there was still much to be improved upon.

The very first emergency medical services model was basically a small emergency service. Training was very minimal and barely covered basic first aid skills. When you think about this it is really unsettling to think that the first emergency medical technicians barely knew much more than what a teenage girl would learn in her babysitting class.  This were the early days of Emergency Medical Services, and the system was just getting started. It certainly does not compare to what is being taught at EMT schools.

The current standards for first aid programs taught by the Red Cross and fire departments are much more extensive than the training that was received at the original EMS model. In today’s emergency medical services system, basic emergency medical technicians  have to learn how to do CPR, use defibrillators, do tracheotomies, use intravenous fluids, and more. During the 1960s, most emergency service workers were considered “ambulance drivers” and almost as much time and energy was spent on learning how to drive these vehicles as there was time spent on medical skills, such as first aid and CPR.

Then, during the 1970s, the focus was shifted to an improvement of service for the patients and injured victims. The training became more extensive and standards were raised in the rending of care for the critically ill. Miami, Seattle, and Los Angeles were some of the first places where the current model for paramedic programs stemmed from. The early EMS workers were pioneers who worked under very restrictive guidelines and procedures. For every emergency call, the paramedics were required to call the hospital and receive permission first to do very basic first aid. This kind of restrictive emergency medical services delivery continued for over an entire decade.

The focus then began to shift during the 1980s. Now instead of just being a transport agency, Emergency medical services evolved into an agency that provided transport and medical care. Workers now just didn’t drive the vehicles to the hospitals and clinics, but they also had to know extensive medical knowledge in order to be able to give life support to critical patients and to be able to treat patients in the vehicles so that their chances of survival were increased during the transport.

No longer were emergency medical technicians called “ambulance drivers”. Now they were called Emergency Medical Technicians, and they were trained in driving all of the vehicles, as well as knowing how to give emergency medical care to their patients.

The medical community began to embrace this branch of service among its ranks, and took a greater interest in how Emergency Medical Services could impact the outcome of their patients. There was a lot more interest from doctors and nurses as to how the treatment in the per-hospital setting could be improved to increase chances of survival for those in life threatening trauma. Various protocols were developed on what the medical community needed to do to help improve these lines of service.