Announcements

Lieutenant Position Filled

Greater Valley Emergency Medical Services recently created a new position in support of  pre-hospital emergency care and non-emergency transport volunteerism within it’s organization.  The Volunteer Medical Division Lieutenant position was recently filled by Valley firefighter and EMT, Mark Orshaw of Athens, PA.  Orshaw holds a Bachelors of Business Administration from Mansfield University and has been an emergency services volunteer for several years.  He holds an EMT-B certification from both the Pennsylvania and New York Departments of Health as well as a Vehicle Rescue Technician certification.  Mark is employed by Yales Music Shop in Sayre and has two children with his wife, Pamela.  His son, Matthew also volunteers at GVEMS and is a paramedic student at Penn Tech. 

 According to Lt. Orshaw, “one of the responsibilities of my position is to recruit, assist and retain new medical division volunteers at GVEMS.  The medical volunteer division staffs the ambulances and paratransit (wheelchair vans) transport vehicles, working side by side with paid staff and supervisors, to assist our communities.”  GVEMS’s emergency responses number over 5000 per year and volunteers are a vital asset to the organization. Volunteers go thru extensive training and the educational opportunities are endless in the pre-hospital emergency field.   

“If someone had suggested to me five years ago that I would be involved in this type of work I would not have believed it” continues Orshaw, “however, I’m very glad I’ve had the opportunity.”  Applications for EMT, Paramedic and Paratransit volunteers are now being accepted. For more information regarding the  GVEMS Volunteer program, please call Sonya Bement, Outreach Supervisor, at 570-888-6000 x228. 

OFFICE STAFF RECEIVES CERTIFICATION

Two members of the Greater Valley EMS billing team recently received certification from the National Academy of Ambulance Coding as Certified Ambulance Coders.  Linda Nichols and Beverly Randall completed the training over a period of eight weeks.  The GVEMS team was among the first in the state to earn certification.

The course consists of approximately thirty hours of training, entirely online, divided into a total of 23 individual courses. It covers core knowledge topics of ambulance billing, including basic anatomy, physiology, terminology, proper interpretation of dispatch, patient care documentation, proper ambulance claim coding and submission, specific payor issues, proper management of the follow-up process, and compliance issues including fraud and abuse and HIPPA.  Competency was achieved with a quiz after each module and a final exam that took nearly two hours to complete. 

Linda Nichols lives in Nichols, NY and has worked at GVEMS for eight years.  Bev Randall lives in Smithboro and has worked at GVEMS for nearly six years.