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A library of best practices in patient care that draws on experiences from Canada, Japan, Australia, and many other countries across the globe; a common naming convention for paramedics rather than a fragmented series of job titles; a forum where any paramedic can join, regardless of their rank and file, and discuss new ideas, converse about innovation that’s occurring in their own jurisdiction, or just to ask questions of their peers in another country. These might seem like far-fetched ideas, but ones that so many who practice paramedicine have discussed in team meetings, over coffee, or during an excited discussion in Las Vegas.

Oddly enough – or not – Las Vegas is one venue where two paramedics – Michael Nolan, President of the Emergency Medical Services Chiefs of Canada and Gary Wingrove, Government Relations and Strategic Affairs with the Mayo Clinic -- started to brainstorm on an idea that will hopefully make the above a reality and perhaps, even contribute to profoundly changing the profession.

“None of those (ideas in Las Vegas) ever happen, but this one has. It came out of a conversation between Gary Wingrove and myself where we saw a need to bring together a larger discussion about the future of the role paramedics play in the community,” said Michael Nolan, President of the Emergency Medical Services Chiefs of Canada. 

He added that there were conversations happening around finding out the “commonalities or synergies that exist around the world” in order to better collaborate and also to eventually promote international policy development, and ultimately “guiding the creation of new systems and strengthening relations.”

Thus a paramedic G5 meeting was called, to bring together representatives from the cross sections of paramedicine to discuss ideas on how these goals could possibly be achieved.

In the spring of this year, a group of individuals met in Ottawa, ON, including practitioners, journalists, academics and researchers, educators, association representatives and people from industry. There were representatives from five different countries at the meeting. And Nolan noted that although there wasn’t a formal agenda when he first started to approach people to get together, there was an overwhelming response of support and enthusiasm.

“We had an immediate and overwhelming acceptance of the concept. People said yes, and then figured out how to get there,” Nolan said.

One of the individuals who attended the Ottawa meeting was Matt Womble, rural hospital and EMS specialist with the State Office of Rural Health and Community Care in North Carolina. Womble was instrumental in bringing forth the idea of an international paramedic association at the G5 meeting.

“I brought to the table a discussion we had the previous August at an international roundtable of community paramedics,” he said.

The group agreed on the basic concept that there should be international representation of paramedics, and after some discussion, it was decided that the group should not exist as a formal association, but should be able to change as the community changes.

“Part of our philosophy too is that we can talk about it, we can think about it, but it won’t happen unless we start to measure out the steps it takes to get there and identify the vision – education, research, funding – all those pieces need to be lined up,” Womble said.

“Ultimately the vision is to become the trusted voice for resource or place where people know they can come and share ideas and they know they can discuss and develop whether its policies, protocols, letter of support, research concepts – we need to be a place where people can know and trust,” Womble said.

Stated on the group’s official website,” Our collective vision is to create a virtual organization of paramedic leaders that will organize and analyze data, create a worldwide vision and strategic plan, work simultaneously to implement the vision around the globe, and to be a resource to nations and organizations of nations. We envision this organization changing shape and potentially course over the next several years as more paramedics join the virtual community.”

Short-term, the priority is to build the community – the idea will work only if there are many involved and dedicated to greater change within paramedicine. Longer term, the hope is that through learning best practices of peers across the globe, policy development, government relations, and consistent messaging, the profession can benefit and be brought forward into the future.

“If you look at policy and research, for example -- in isolation both of them are powerful, but when you put them together, I think they can be extraordinary. Especially when you have advocacy and common messaging that come out of that. We can align best practices, we can influence government, we can find funding, and ultimately improve our ability to provide care for patients,” stated Nolan.

The first priority is to have everyone on board who wants to contribute. As Womble says, there are so many individuals who are passionate about collaboration and moving the profession forward. They just need to get in on the conversation.

“I think everybody who’s doing that has this real desire to prove a profession and prove the care we provide as a profession somewhere deep down in our souls. I think it’s a calling; it’s something that we just can’t get away from. So long term, to me, International Paramedic has an amazing amount of opportunity and potential based on the number of people and increasing number to improve care and improve the profession,” he said.

Several avenues have been set up in order to invite collaboration from the community. The website, www.internationalparamedic.org, is meant to gather a knowledge base of resources from across the globe – best practices, evidence based research studies, and innovations that are happening in communities everywhere. Once a substantial knowledge base is collected, the sky’s the limit.

“We need to transfer our knowledge on research, we need to combine our body of knowledge across the globe. Language should not be a barrier – IP will assist in reducing that barrier. We’ve not even agreed that there will be a common language. We’ve obviously started in English but we have a number of languages around the table, each of who can take that message and distribute it in their own environment,” Nolan said.

On the website you can register, log in and add to the wiki, as well as join in forum discussions. From there, you can also join the Facebook page, and follow the group on Twitter. 

So far, the group includes approximately 350 registrants -- so what are you waiting for? Want to invoke positive change? Go to www.internationalparamedic.org.