The Warrenton Fire Protection District and Wright City Fire Protection District will now respond to calls with the Warren County Ambulance District (WCAD) to enhance the emergency medical services in the county.Chief Ron MacKnight, Wright City Fire Protection District, said this new protocol will help save lives.“Warren County Ambulance District personnel do an exceptional job. They are professional and they have tremendous support in the community,” he said.“These new fire district response protocols are designed to enhance the safety of citizens and visitors to our community by dispatching a larger cache of trained first responders to the wide variety of emergency events that take place in our community.”He added, “Our goal is to complement (the ambulance district’s) responses and assist their paramedics when we can.”Both fire districts have progressed in recent years from fully volunteer agencies to combination-type departments with full-time professionals, as well as part-time professionals and volunteer professional firefighters.By doing so, each fire district has dramatically increased the capability of trained and competent medical first responders on duty 24/7. These firefighters will now be used to supplement the award-winning services of the Warren County Ambulance District as Basic Life Support first responders, responding to life-threatening medical emergencies along with the ambulance district.Each fire district and the Warren County Ambulance District have contracts with SSM Health to provide medical direction and oversight.“The benefit of having all three agencies having the same medical director means that we all work under identical treatment protocols,” said Chief Mike Owenby of Warrenton Fire Protection District.“The new protocols allow, in most cases, both the paramedics of the ambulance district and the firefighters as basic responders to treat life-threatening conditions as a team.”The new response protocols will increase the number and types of calls to which the two fire agencies will respond. Fire crews have historically been called to the scenes of motor vehicle crashes, traumatic injuries, and in those times in which the ambulance crews need assistance.And the ambulance district has, in like fashion, responded to structure fires in the area, to treat victims of the fire, but also to aid in the safety of the firefighters by evaluating their physical status during the fire suppression. Ambulance crews work to insure that firefighters are hydrated properly and within the jointly established medical parameters.Now, “our fire districts will also be responding to other serious medical events such as cardiac arrests, to assist (the ambulance district),” said Chief Owenby.Both fire districts serve areas in Lincoln County and have responded to these types of emergency medical calls with Lincoln County Ambulance District for a number of years.Firefighter / EMS