by Olivia P. Tucker
Times Reporter
Scott County Board of Commissioners discussed the possibility of having medical flight costs waived for Scott County residents and costs shared with the Austin and Scottsburg when they met May 3.
PHI Cares is an emergency air ambulance/medical service that transports anyone that Scott County EMS or dispatch deems as needing to be flown to a hospital that can specialize in the emergency care a person needs.
Commissioners’ President Mike Jones asked about uninsured patients, “Will this agreement cover the individual needing an air ambulance?”
PHI Cares Regional Sales Manager Jill Spaulding said, “We do not pick and choose who we cover, so every resident of Scott County would be covered if they are flown from Scott County or the adjacent counties.”
The adjacent counties that are included in the coverage for Scott County residents are Jackson, Jennings, Jefferson, Clark and Washington.
“If the commissioners decide to approve the county wide agreement, if a resident is flown by a PHI helicopter from Scott County or any adjacent county, and they don’t have insurance then we are taking care of the entire bill,” said Spaulding. “If they have insurance we will bill the insurance company first.”
Spaulding said that the billing of the hospital and ambulance will see that the deductible and out of pocket are paid even though the person might not have paid it because of PHI writing it off as covered.
Luke Lamar, a flight paramedic for PHI told the commissioners that there have been 70 flights through PHI just from Scott County EMS calling for an air ambulance.
The cost for this agreement for Scott County would be $66,682, which would be roughly $7 per household for the 9,526 homes in the county. The cost is based on the census of the population of Scott County and could increase or decrease depending on the number of households.
Spaulding said that the fee is annual and coverage begins for 12 months from the date it is signed by the commissioners.
Commissioner Randy Julian said that the commissioners should table the decision because of being uncertain of where the funding is going to come.
Commissioner Greg Prince added that the matter needed to be discussed further and also agreed to table any further decisions on an agreement with PHI.
“The reason I want to table this is because I want to reach out to the mayor of Austin and the mayor of Scottsburg and see if we can get them to buy into plan to help pay for this. The fact is that both cities have more residents than the county has. I would like to see if they would be willing to try to split it and pay some of the costs,” said Jones.