Police Paramedics

[muleskinner]

Ok all with the recent talk about tactical medics I would like to bring up some questions about Police Paramedics that have been on my mind. In MN here we have three dept's where a good chunk of the force of officers are also the paramedics for the towns EMS service and the EMS PD are set up that way. If a medical call comes in, these medic cops respond and if the patient care warrants it they ride along in the ambulance on the way to the hospital giving care at the paramedic level, these officers carry defibs and paramedic drug boxes in their cars which they transfer to the ambulance if patient cares warrants it. If the call ends up being say a broken leg were EMT-B's or I's can handle it the officer medic determines this and turns care over the the B's or I's who brought the ambulance to the scene and gets back in the sqaud to go back in police officer mode. Now my question is where do the roles and respnsibilities of each job start and stop??? Let's say for example that a call goes out for a man unresponsive. The officer medic gets to the scene followed by the ambulance and finds the man od'd on drugs and see's drugs and paraphanaila(sp) around the house as he walks in. As a medic his first responsibility is patient care. So the officer takes the patient to the hospital. Is the information he obtained as a medic restricted from being used as a cop or does he go get a warrant or have enough probable cause to call for backup to search the house or raid it at a later date? Or is that medic obtained info left alone due to the medic side of his job, being different from the LE? Also working in EMS as I do I can see where some of the calls that might be responded to could directly lead the the arrest of the patient. Can an arrest like this take place or should this be allowed to happen? I can see were it would be a discouragment against some people calling EMS. Any thoughts, opinions, answers, or counter questions I would love to hear as I have been wondering about this subject for quite some time.
Thanx everyone
Mule

[JimSpoor]

First off; kudos to the PD and the ALS first response they have initiated. Sounds great. Quite a few PDs are going the 1st responder/AED route. I hear of very few that do ALS. I know Nassau Cty. PD on Long Island runs its own EMS and NYPD has a limited EMS capacity. Not heard of too many others, although the public safety/combined services agency model is being used in some parts of the country

The meat of your question has been discussed before in related threads. IIRC the topic was about combined public safety agencies. It seems to me that there would have to be strict SOPs regarding the source, purpose and under which context info was gathered. ie. I admit to drug use to "my" EMS provider as requested so s/he can make informed decisions regarding my care. The next day the officer comes to my residence with an arrest warrant based on knowledge gained on the EMS run. I think any court would find that information privileged, or at the least tainted.

There can be a million different examples. I guess as long as you err on the side of patient confidentiality you should be OK.