MEXICO – Sunday night’s crash between a Med-Care ambulance rushing to a call and a tractor-trailer on Route 108 severely impacted the emergency medical service.

Med-Care Director Dean Milligan learned Monday that the rescue service would only get a $65,000 check from its insurance company for the totaled 2000 ambulance, which cost $118,000.

“Though this is a tremendous setback to the company, the employees are remaining focused at this time and continuing to do their jobs while remaining the professionals that they all are,” Milligan said Monday.

The company also has another ambulance that is past due to be replaced, but Med-Care had been putting that off until its financial status could support getting another ambulance, he added.

And, not only did Med-Care lose its newest ambulance of a fleet of six, but the two employees who were injured in the 5:48 p.m. wreck, won’t be back to work anytime soon.

Emergency medical technician Veronica Duguay, 43, of Livermore Falls, who was driving the ambulance, is recovering from non life-threatening injuries after being released this week from Central Maine Medical Center in Lewiston.

Duguay’s passenger, paramedic Rhonda Chase, 51, of Rumford, who extricated herself from the wreckage that trapped Duguay, is also recovering from non life-threatening injuries.

Neither Duguay nor Chase would be returning to work until they had fully recovered, Milligan said.

“We lost two of our valuable employees, one of whom was a full-time worker, so that will make it harder to cover shifts. I’m also concerned about the post traumatic stress they may have to get in an ambulance again,” he added.

That night, Duguay and Chase were on their way back to the area after having transported a Rumford Hospital patient to CMMC, when they received a 5:39 p.m. call to back up another Med-Care ambulance responding to a cardiac arrest incident in Rumford.

Due to the weekend’s mixed-precipitation storm, Med-Care had responded to 47 calls from 8 a.m. Friday, through midnight Sunday, Milligan said.

“Thirty-nine of those 47 calls occurred Saturday and Sunday during the inclement weather. Conditions were horrible at the time of the wreck,” he said.

Duguay and Chase have been Med-Care employees for seven and 10 years, respectively, and each has an incident-free personnel record, and “are exemplary employees,” Milligan said.

Both have also participated in, and are certified in the Emergency Vehicle Operations Course, as well as an abundance of other safety-related training, he added.

tkarkos@sunjournal.com

Copy the Story Link