Overton EMS Receives Grant To Purchase CPR Devices

Overton County EMS has received a new $71,000 federal grant.

Ambulance Services Director Jim Morgan said that the ARP funding will allow the department to purchase new LUCAS chest compression devices.

“They kind of help the crews perform CPR in the back of the ambulances,” Morgan said. “So you can actually do it with the device and one person and not have to have the extra people in the back of the ambulances.

Morgan said that the grant is a huge help because the department will not have to use taxpayer dollars to pay for needed equipment. He said that that this is the second federal grant the department received in regards to COVID relief. He said that they used most of that $50,000 grant to purchase PPE equipment.

Morgan said that they plan to get the equipment purchased in the next year.

“There’ll be some training when we purchase the devices,” Morgan said. “As far as the timeline, it’ll probably be a year or so before they ask us to have it spent, and then there will probably be a reporting timeline after that. So it’s probably a year-and-a-half away before we have to do the reporting on something like that.”