Improved Process Keeps Gets Ambulances Back On The Road Faster
A partnership between Kingston Health Sciences Centre (KHSC) and Frontenac Paramedics is helping ambulances return to the community more quickly after bringing patients to the Emergency Department, improving the community’s access to emergency medical services while enhancing patient flow inside the department.
This spring, ambulance offload times at KHSC's Emergency Department were approximately 44 per cent lower than during the same time period from the previous year, despite the hospital operating at close to 100% capacity.
The improvement follows more than two years of collaboration between frontline emergency department teams, hospital leaders and Frontenac Paramedics to redesign how patients arriving by ambulance are received and transferred into the hospital’s care.
"When paramedics can transfer care more quickly, they can get back on the road sooner to respond to the next emergency," said Jason Hann, Executive Vice-President of Patient Care at KHSC. "This has been a true partnership, built around a shared goal of improving care for patients while strengthening emergency services for our entire community."
The partnership got a boost in spring 2025, when Frontenac Paramedics and KHSC introduced an ambulance offload triage process to identify patients who were medically stable and able to safely stay in the waiting room rather than remain on an ambulance stretcher.
More recently, additional improvements have further streamlined patient transfers. Paramedics can now register appropriate "fit-to-sit" patients directly with registration staff before they await nursing assessment, allowing ambulance crews to complete transfers in just minutes. At the same time, a dedicated offload nurse now cares for recently transferred patients, enabling triage nurses to focus on patients requiring immediate medical assessment.
"These improvements demonstrate what's possible when hospitals and paramedic services work together to tackle shared challenges," said Jeremie Hurtubise, Deputy Chief of Operations for Frontenac Paramedics. "By reducing the time our crews spend waiting to transfer care, we're able to return ambulances to the community sooner while ensuring patients continue to receive safe, high-quality care."
And this week, the Province of Ontario has come through with added funding.
In a media release from MPP John Jordan, the province announced new funding for Frontenac Paramedics and for a triage nurse at KSHS.
“I am proud to support the dedicated team at Frontenac Paramedics”, said John Jordan, MPP for Lanark-Frontenac-Kingston and Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Health. “This vital investment from our government strengthens the essential work our paramedics do every day – responding with compassion, skill and speed, to keep our residents safe. My sincere thanks to Chief Goudie and members of this staff for their unwavering commitment to the communities they serve.”
In Frontenac County, Ontario is increasing land ambulance funding by 14 per cent, bringing the province’s total investment in the region to over $14 million this year. This investment is part of the more than $1 billion in land ambulance funding Ontario is providing municipalities across the province this year, representing an average increase of 9 per cent from 2025.
In addition, to further reduce delays paramedics encounter when arriving at hospitals to transfer patients, Ontario is investing $547,635 through the Dedicated Offload Nurses Program to hire nurses and other eligible health professionals dedicated to offloading ambulance patients in hospital emergency departments.
“I want to thank MPP Jordan and the provincial government for this year’s LASG increase and for their continued support for the dedicated off-load nurse position at Kingston General Hospital. Commitments like these help paramedics preserve our capacity to deliver critical services to the residents of Frontenac County and Kingston even as demand pressure continues to rise. This important announcement also symbolizes government support for paramedics and for our profession. Thank you.” – Marc Goudie, Paramedic Chief / Director, Frontenac Paramedics.
