(Radio Chatter) If you live in a rural area and require immediate medical attention, how long will it take for you to receive help?

And with the recent strain on hospital space and staff, where will the emergency crews even take you?

The answer to those questions and what's being done to help with response times and patient care, Is this episode of Good Roots.

The vast majority of Arkansas can be considered rule with populations heavily consolidated in only a few areas.

For most Arkansans, medical care means travel, and for some a considerable distance, whether that's for a traumatic event and irrate or even to get a vaccine.

I'm Robert Thurlby retired from general internal medicine practice in Russellville and Dover, Arkansas.

If someone is moving to a rural area, they need to do research.

The ambulance practice number of specialists, what's available in their town that they're going to be dependent upon, particularly if they've got an ongoing medical problem that that requires some sophistication.

The ambulance program has improved, they've moved out and into some of the boroughs.

And they were reaching people earlier.

Also 911 can get you a helicopter in quickly.

In many instances, emergency medicine starts with lights and sirens, ambulances and fire trucks for Arkansans living in more rural areas.

It can take up to an hour or more for an ambulance to reach the seam.

Much of that depends on staffing locations, access and equipment.

I have first hand experience in Rule EMS responding to all kinds of emergencies, from traumas in car wrecks, diabetic cardiac emergencies after spending.

Eight years on, an annual.

What is Med tech and what do y'all do?

Medtech EMS of Conway County we provide a paramedic level service for all of Conway County.

We have two primary trucks that are paramount, little trucks that we staffed 24/7 365 days a year all the time, all the time.

And then we have a reserve unit that we can staff fairly quickly if needed.

If all of the trucks are out, it doesn't happen.

So y'all covered the entire county.

So how long would it take to get?

To the outskirts of of the county, probably at the Max.

Running Code 3, which is lots of sirens and pending traffic, gets out of our way about 30 minutes, about 30 minutes.

OK on the on the long side.

So what has COVID done for EMS?

It's been a big challenge, so with COVID it slowed our response on every other call.

Basically because when we have a COVID transport we have guidelines we have to follow the protocols once they have transported patients, they come back, they have to completely be contaminate the unit and then they have to decontaminate themselves which means shower.

Change of uniform everything it's been tough and our guys.

It's real.

You know when you think about the long extended transports that they have.

Sometimes with COVID it's there in either in 95 masks or half face respirator masks.

They have full, you know, gown suit, you know topic suit on so it's it's definitely wears on them.

They see the effects of COVID and what it's doing to their patients and it's it's definitely definitely words on what biggest challenges have you seen at the hospital then dealing with at the hospital that's been white time everybody.

Doing their best, let me start with that.

Everybody is doing their best.

It's just this is a territory we've never seen before.

All of the COVID beds are taken, just the other day we made a transport all the way to Mina.

That's a 5 hour turn around time for a transport to Mina, so there's no specialty necessarily that our hospital doesn't have.

It's just they have COVID units, a COVID unit.

So, and that was the only COVID bed available in the whole state at that time.

EMS typically take patients to the closest emergency department, however many times in rural areas they are inadequately.

Equipped and staffed to deal with the most severe cases and the patient is better suited at a higher level of care.

For example, a larger hospital in Little Rock.

Pediatric surgeon Doctor Todd Maxon is the chief of the trauma system at Arkansas Children's Hospital in which he helped to create, and unfortunately, the beds in our trauma centers are at or near capacity.

The impact that I've seen from COVID on the trauma system is pretty significant.

I mean, we really have.

Two goals now we must continue to provide outstanding care, but we've got to protect ourselves because if we're infected or we spread this, then we just simply don't have the personnel to continue to perform.

It's almost a daily analysis of whether we're going to have enough space to continue to do this, so everything we can do in this state to curb the spread of COVID has such important downstream effects for us.

The Arkansas Department of Health, along with several other private health care providers.

Have begun to focus on establishing COVID-19 vaccination clinics in more rural areas across the state in an effort to provide all that would like to receive the vaccine and opportunity.

You can find that list on healthy Arkansas Gov.

I feel that rural Arkansans definitely have access to vaccine and people will call me and ask me should I take this vaccine and my answer is yes.

Both my lovely wife and I've have both had COVID-19 the disease and we both had dual shots.

Are case incidence is going up and we're leading the United States in two areas.

They're both of which are bad.

Let's do something about it.

We have so many health care workers that are that have been out from COVID or or continuing to be out from COVID.

So we've got to get ahead of this.

It is absolutely changing what we do.

Living in rural Arkansas offers many joys, but health care is an aspect of life we all must face for good roots.

I'm Logan Duvall.

Major funding for good roots is provided by Arkansas Farm Bureau, Arkansas Farm Bureau advocating the interests of Arkansas's largest industry for more than 80 years.

Arkansas counts on agriculture, agriculture counts on Farm Bureau.