Weeding through ambulance listings and finding what you need can be a monumental task even for seasoned emergency medical technicians. Local emergency ambulance services should be staffed by certified emergency medical technicians and emergency medical technicians paramedic level. The difference in the two types of technicians is the amount of emergency medical training and course study. EMT Paramedic training requires further study and hands on applications in cardiac calls, pharmacy drugs and advanced life support. While all EMT study course require knowledge of the fields, Paramedics receive more in depth trainings and applications in some fields. Almost all of the emergency ambulance services require constant continuing education classes and uniforms of the medical technician pants paired with a shirt displaying the company name, medic name and the medic's level of certification. EMTs are also required to maintain education for medical emergencies such as heart attacks, CPR changes, childbirth and difficulty breathing to name a few. Local emergency ambulance services generally range from companies that supply strictly 911 medical emergency calls to companies that supply assisted care to and from dialysis, doctor visits and nursing homes. Occasionally 911 medical emergency services are called to assist other services in the area due to high call numbers or specific service needs such as lift assistance. The benefits of using a local ambulance service that provides transport services is the trained EMT and EMT Paramedic personnel who know the area and are trained to handle medical emergencies should the patient status change during the transport time. This includes diverting to a local hospital trained to handle the change in the patient as opposed to the nearest hospital. Many local emergency ambulance services privately owned now offer long distance transports as well. These transports are generally over 100 miles from place of patient pickup. Examples of these transports would be taking a patient to a long term care rehabilitation facility closer to the patient home or returning the patient home after a specialized treatment. Transports such as these generally required the training the EMT and EMT Paramedics have to manage the patient for a long trip.
