A new Anderson-based medical helicopter service took to the skies for the first time Monday, but the Anderson Area Medical Center may not be the first stop for some of the patients it picks up in the Upstate and northeast Georgia.
Medshore Ambulance Service’s Sky Care unit still hasn’t gotten a commitment from AnMed to build a heliport outside the hospital’s emergency room, eight months after the new service was announced last fall.
AnMed is evaluating whether the hospital and its physicians can handle an expected increase in trauma cases that would come to the hospital from as far away as northeast Georgia and western North Carolina — many without insurance. The hospital also worries a heliport would gobble up 20 percent of its emergency room parking.
Garrick Chidester, AnMed’s vice president of network development, said no deadline for a decision on a heliport was set.
"If we feel we have the capacity ? and the physicians feel comfortable, and we have adequate parking, we’ll move forward with it," he said.
Greg Shore, Sky Care’s chief executive officer, said most critically injured patients outside Anderson County would be flown to Greenville Memorial Hospital — the Upstate’s top trauma center — until a heliport is built.
From its current base at the Anderson Regional Airport on S.C. 24, it would take an extra 15 minutes to transport patients the extra distance by ambulance, he said.
A temporary plan to park the helicopter at the AnMed health Campus on East Greenville Street wouldn’t shave much extra time either.
Sky Care is aimed at a growing demand for speedier critical care, especially in rural areas without hospitals and could provide better access to AnMed’s heart-care program, Mr. Shore said.
The service joins medical helicopters already in service in Greenville, Spartanburg and Commerce, Ga. that are increasingly busy. In one case this spring, an 11-year-old Pendleton girl with a serious head injury waited 50 minutes for a helicopter to arrive from Gainesville, Ga.
With the addition of Sky Care, "we’re going to be well covered," Anderson County Public Safety Director Tommy Thompson said.
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