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News Release

Media Contacts:
Christina Chavira
Communications Specialist
530.332.5589 - office; 530.588.4411 - cell
christina.chavira@enloe.org   

Enloe FlightCare receives CAMTS accreditation

CHICO, Calif., Dec. 5, 2008 – The Commission on Accreditation of Medical Transport Systems (CAMTS) recently announced that it awarded Enloe FlightCare a full three-year accreditation, recognizing that the medical transport rotor-wing service provides “highly skilled flight nurse/paramedic teams to care for adult and pediatric patients.”

CAMTS is an organization that is dedicated to improving the quality and safety of medical transport services. It offers a program of voluntary evaluation of compliance with accreditation standards demonstrating the ability to deliver service of a specific quality, with the highest priorities being patient care and safety of the transport environment. To obtain accreditation, a medical transport service must be in substantial compliance with the organization’s accreditation standards. As of November there were seven accredited services in California and 146 in the United States, according to the CAMTS website.

“The accreditation process was an arduous undertaking,” said Judy Cline, Trauma Coordinator and Chief Flight Nurse, “but we feel it truly validates FlightCare’s mission to promote and provide safe, high-quality, cost-effective air-medical transport to patients.” This was the first time that Enloe applied for the accreditation.

About Enloe FlightCare: Enloe Medical Center's FlightCare helicopter took to the air in August 1985 as the first ambulance helicopter north of Sacramento. The FlightCare Program grew out of the need to rapidly transport patients from the growing mountain communities of Chester, Quincy and Greenville to Enloe. FlightCare has transported more than 12,700 patients. It responds to emergencies within a 75-mile radius of Enloe, in counties including Butte, Tehama, Glenn, Plumas, Colusa, Sierra, Yuba and parts of Lassen.

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Enloe Medical Center is a local, nonprofit health care organization. For more information, please call 530/332-7300 or visit us online at http://www.enloe.org.   Enloe Medical Center is located at 1531 Esplanade Chico, Calif.  95926.