American Heart Association presents the Mission: Lifeline® EMS Gold achievement award for proven dedication to ensuring access to best practices and life-saving care.
Lee County Emergency Medical Services has received the American Heart Association’s Mission: Lifeline® EMS Gold achievement award for its commitment to offering rapid and research-based care to people experiencing the most severe form of heart attacks and strokes, ultimately saving lives. This is the 11th consecutive year for the national recognition.
Mission: Lifeline® EMS is the American Heart Association’s national initiative to advance the system of care for patients with high-risk, time-sensitive disease states, such as severe heart attacks and strokes. The program helps reduce barriers to prompt treatment — starting from when 911 is called, to EMS transport and continuing through hospital treatment and discharge. Optimal care for heart attack and stroke patients takes coordination between the individual prehospital providers and healthcare systems.
The Mission: Lifeline EMS achievement award focuses on agencies’ on-scene care, bringing to the forefront the collaboration and contributions to patient care for prehospital providers.
“Arguably the most important link in the chains of survival for acute stroke and cardiovascular emergencies is emergency medical services and prehospital professionals,” said Kacey Kronenfeld, M.D., FAEMS, chair of the American Heart Association’s Mission: Lifeline EMS Taskforce. “The American Heart Association Mission: Lifeline EMS awards are an important way to recognize the crucial roles and performances of EMS personnel in stroke and cardiac patients’ care.”
In 2024, Lee County EMS responded to:
- 3,420 chest pain patients
- 1,836 stroke patients
- About 1,000 cardiac arrest patients
Each EMT and paramedic takes an average of 35 hours of training annually to be prepared for these types of incidents.
Lee County EMS is a division of Lee County Public Safety, which also includes emergency telecommunications and fire/EMS dispatch, Emergency Management and all E-911/government communications network infrastructure.
Lee County’s Department of Public Safety holds four accreditations. The services provided by the department also are accredited by the International Academies of Emergency Dispatch for both fire and EMS communications. LeeFlight, the county’s air medical program, is accredited by the Commission on Accreditation of Medical Transportation Services.
Mission: Lifeline EMS® recognition is the American Heart Association’s program that recognizes prehospital emergency agencies for their quality of care for heart attack and stroke patients. The recognition program focuses on transforming care quality by connecting all heart attack and stroke care components into a seamlessly integrated care system. Key tenets of these systems of care reinforce evidence-based guidelines and measure performance, identify gaps, and engage in quality improvement.
To learn more about the program, go to Lee County Public Safety’s YouTube channel for a short video about this award or click here https://youtu.be/pgcFogqrrdg
For more information, visit heart.org. To receive updates from Lee County Government, sign up for the newsletter here: www.leegov.com/resources/newsletters. Follow Lee County Government on Facebook, www.facebook.com/leecountyflbocc.
