Clay county ambulance service training grant - this grant is being pursued to help train the EMS staff of clay county ambulance service located in clay county, west virginia

The EMS staff is made up of 18 providers two of which also serve as the director and assistant director. These few individuals take great pride in serving its citizens. Clay county, west virginia is a rural county located in the central part of west virginia. The most recent census data shows clay county has a population of 8,051. Clay county ambulance service is the only ambulance service that serves the county. Clay has a land area in square miles of 341.90. Over 23% of the citizens of clay county are people considered to be living in poverty. The county does not have a grocery store or hospital within 45 minutes of the county seat of clay. The closet level 1 trauma center, cardiac center, and stroke center are located almost an hour away approximately 48 miles from the county seat. The population of clay county is an older population with over 21% of its population being 65+ years old. The rural nature of clay county, having only one ambulance service, zero hospitals, and no in county health care available to its citizens after 6:00 PM causes many physical and mental health issues for the people of clay county to go untreated. The lack of 24/7 health care, being rural, and poor leads to many mental health and drug related issues for our population. The state of west virginia has 24.6% of its adults living with a mental illness which is much higher than the national rate of 19.9% as reported by KFF.ORG. This organization also shows west virginia with a drug overdose death rate of 76.3% per 100,000 people as compared to the united states rate of 28.3 per 100,000. The heatlh care barriers of lack of access and distance to proper treatment, along with the mental health and drug issues within our county and state are the reasons this grant is highly needed to train the EMS providers on the proper way to treat and handle our patients. Without a grant like this our rural service provider would never have access to training and training equipment that they deserve and need to properly and effectively care for the patients in our community. We will use this grant to purchase trainings that will help current EVO's to become EMT's, help providers to maintain their current certifications, and purchase a smart manikin and other hands-on training equipment that will allow providers to practice their life-saving skills. Providers will have access to a few different training sites that will allow them to meet both state/federal training requirements including refresher courses, MCI, and hazmat trainings. Providers will also have access to a smart manikin to learn needed skills. Because we know all students learn in different ways the online lectures, self-guided study plans, video scenarios and access to practice skills hands-on by using the manikin providers will be able to learn by using their preferred method. This grant if awarded could truly be a turning point for clay county ambulance service and our community. We are a small and rural agency, that our only funding comes from the calls we transport. This grant will allow US to provide training that is above and beyond the required training to maintain provider certification. We will be able to address areas of training like mental and substance abuse disorders that many members of our community suffer from, while also providing our emergency care givers availability to resources that deal with the stresses of their job as well. In addition, to the trainings we will also be able to purchase required PPE to protect our providers and 2 lucas devices to aid in life saving CPR. Our community and providers need and deserve these resources. Good equipment and training will help US to recruit and retain employees that normally wouldn't consider working for US.