LifeLine in danger of shutting down
"Indigent care is draining the business." -Jonah Thomas
By Arthur McLean Editor

The rumors of LifeLine Paramedic's eminent demise are just that for now, but the ambulance service's owners say the company cannot continue operating under current conditions for much longer.

Jonah Thomas, manager of the ambulance service said the company's financial position has gotten worse since the county was split between LifeLine and Jets.

"When we agreed to the boundary lines (dividing the county into north and south service areas for the ambulance services), we lost the Grove Hill hospital," Thomas said. With that split, LifeLine became responsible for all 911 calls in the north end of the county, and most of those trips wind up not getting paid.

Thomas and owner Vida McDaniel estimated that 90 percent of the 911 calls LifeLine runs don't pay the bill. Combine that with a looming reduction in Medicare payments of 25 percent, and the service is looking at serious financial trouble.

Already the service has been running a deficit of several thousand dollars per month, Thomas said. "I came back here to see an ambulance service in town, not to make a profit," he said. But he also said that if some help is not forthcoming, the service may have to shut down sooner rather than later.

If that happens, Thomas said another service could come in, but it will want to make sure it makes a profit.

"We've had consultants come in, look at the books and tell us we're running as lean as we can," Thomas said, but it's still not enough. LifeLine currently employs 28 people, but Thomas said he's already lost three paramedics because they were unsure they'd have a job down the road.

The solution, LifeLine's owners believe is outside support. "You look at the surrounding counties, and they recognize the need for an ambulance service and that they have to subsidize it," Thomas said. Choctaw County's service is completely taxpayer funded. Research by The Thomasville Times shows that numerous other rural areas around the state are also facing the issue of how to keep rural ambulance services running in the face of higher fuel and healthcare costs, low repayment rates and difficulty in finding trained paramedics.

Currently, LifeLine receives no public subsidy beyond repayments from Medicare and Medicaid, but Thomas and McDaniel will be making their case to county and city officials this week, and asking for help.

"We're not just going out and saying give us money, we're still trying ways to make it work, but indigent care is draining the business and we can't expect the owners to continue subsidizing it on their own," Thomas said. McDaniel said 48 percent of the service's recent hospital transfers were either paid by Medicaid at a reduced rate, or were not paid at all.

Thomas said he couldn't give a time line for how long the service would continue without help.

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