The Johnson County Ambulance Service saw an 11 percent increase in the volume of calls it received compared to 2021.

The service has experienced 14,315 ambulance calls so far in 2022.

Fiona Johnson, director of the ambulance department, presented the increase during Wednesday’s Johnson County Board of Supervisors work session.

Johnson provided updates on a new program the ambulance department recently added to their services: the Field Training Officer Program. The program involves seven officers who have been trained in educational instruction and assist new hires in learning on the job.

The service will also give credit to new hires for past Emergency Medical Services experience, allowing them to receive a higher wage thanks to their experience. Johnson said the hope is that this will be an incentive for more experienced and quality candidates to apply.

RELATED: Johnson County Ambulance services experiencing staffing shortages 

The proposal is pending formal approval.

After a proposal for changing the number of full-time equivalent positions was approved by the board in June, the ambulance service now has more ambulances available for calls. The number of ambulances available on a day-to-day basis are:

• 4 ambulances available for 24 hours, seven days a week
• 5 ambulances available for 16 hours, seven days a week
• 6 ambulances available for 8 hours, seven days a week

Johnson also revealed two new training courses have been provided to ambulance staff in the past year focusing on prehospital trauma life support and advanced medical life support.

This year, the ambulance service also received a “gold standard” in ambulance care by the Commission on Accreditation of Ambulance Services. Johnson County Ambulance Service is one of three ambulance services in Iowa to be accredited.