The Prince Albert Police Service, Parkland Ambulance and Saskatchewan Health Authority have announced a new joint initiative.
The three organizations say they have teamed up to ensure people who are arrested and brought into custody by P.A. Police have access to a paramedic and on-call doctor.
The goal of the initiative is to better medically assess those in cells.
Police Chief Jon Bergen said nearly 6,000 people are arrested every year in the city and about half these arrests are the result of some sort of serious drug or alcohol intoxication.
“Having a trained paramedic that knows how to assess any medical need for anyone that comes into our detention centre is definitely an enhanced model, is not new to policing but is new to Prince Albert police,” he said.
The joint initiative is a pilot program that will run for one year and began on May 1.
It will also see a senior police officer present to supervise the holding cell area.
Funding for the program is from the provincial mental health and addictions budget.
Bergen said officers will now be better able to determine what is and what is not a medical emergency.
“Now with a paramedic who has a much higher level of training, as it relates to health and has the equipment to properly assess and triage somebody, we’ll be able to properly assess when somebody needs to go to the hospital and when somebody needs to be monitored here in the detention centre.”
Parkland Ambulance Care Chief Trevor Dutchak said in a released statement he is looking forward to continuing the initiative that also ran for one year in 2018.
He added the only difference in the new program is in regards to staffing.
“We know that when we are able to assess and care for these people without delay, it improves their health outcomes and reduces the burdens on hospitals,” he said.
With files from Fraser Needham.
(PHOTO: Prince Albert Police Service Headquarters. Courtesy P.A. Police Twitter)