7,025 agencies respond to 2021 EMS for Children Survey

A total of 7,025 EMS agencies responded to this year’s EMS for Children Survey, which was sent to 15,768 EMS agencies across 58 states and territories. After the data was cleaned, the number of EMS agencies used in the performance measure calculations below was adjusted to include only those agencies that met the performance measure criteria (6,910 agencies).

The survey was conducted between January and March of 2021 by the National Emergency Medical Services for Children (EMSC) Data Analysis Resource Center (NEDARC). The goal of the survey is to improve understanding of EMS agencies’ ability to care for children by collecting data on two specific EMSC performance measures: Performance Measure 02 assesses if an agency has access to a pediatric emergency care coordinator (PECC), while Performance Measure 03 focuses on an agency’s process for skill-checking on pediatric equipment.

Key takeaways and data dissemination

Survey data are disseminated to EMSC State Partnership program managers through custom national and state-specific data reports and visualizations built by NEDARC. Additionally, each year, NEDARC creates a National EMSC Report for EMS Agencies. This three-page report of aggregate national data is intended to be shared with EMS agencies and was recently sent to all agencies for which NEDARC had an email address.

Key takeaways from the national report include:

• Slightly more than one-third (35.7%) of EMS agencies have a PECC on staff, while 4.3% plan to add a PECC and 18.2% expressed interest in having one. 41.8% did not have a PECC.
• The majority of EMS agencies (56.6%) reported having limited frequency of skills checking on pediatric equipment. 19.2% reported moderate training; 18.8% reported no or very little training; and 5.4% reported extensive training.

“The report also serves to thank the EMS agencies that completed the survey,” says Andrea Genovesi, MA, NEDARC Operations Manager. “And it helps NEDARC to validate email addresses for, and is the first step in promoting, the next year’s EMS for Children Survey.”

Gearing up for the 2022 survey

The 2022 EMS for Children Survey is fast approaching and will launch in January 2022. NEDARC is in the process of creating data quality reports that will be sent to State Partnership program managers to aid them with updating and improving their state EMS agency contact lists.

This year, these reports are being streamlined to focus on only the data that is needed to successfully reach the agency contact person. State Partnership program managers can expect to hear more about the data quality reports and other information pertaining to the 2022 EMS for Children Survey in the coming months.

To learn more about the EMS for Children Survey, visit NEDARC’s performance measures webpage. You can also view a recording of an All-Grantee Session about this survey – and the National Pediatric Readiness Project assessment – here.

For resources on improving pediatric care in prehospital settings, visit the Prehospital Pediatric Readiness Project webpage.