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TITLE 25HEALTH SERVICES
PART 1DEPARTMENT OF STATE HEALTH SERVICES
CHAPTER 157EMERGENCY MEDICAL CARE
SUBCHAPTER AEMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICES - PART A
RULE §157.2Definitions

  (62) Operational name - Name under which the business or operation is conducted and presented to the world.

  (63) Operational policies - Policies and procedures which are the basis for the provision of EMS and which include, but are not limited to such areas as vehicle maintenance, proper maintenance and storage of supplies, equipment, medications, and patient care devices; complaint investigation, multicasualty incidents, and hazardous materials; but do not include personnel or financial policies.

  (64) Out of service vehicle - The period when a licensed EMS Provider vehicle is unable to respond or be response ready for an emergency or non-emergency response.

  (65) Person - An individual, corporation, organization, government, governmental subdivision or agency, business, trust, partnership, association, or any other legal entity.

  (66) Prehospital triage - The process of identifying medical/injury acuity or the potential for severe injury based upon physiological criteria, injury patterns, and/or high-energy mechanisms and transporting patients to a facility appropriate for their medical/injury needs. Prehospital triage for injury victims is guided by the prehospital triage protocol adopted by the regional advisory council (RAC) and approved by the department.

  (67) Practical exam - Sometime referred to as psychomotor, is an exam that assesses the subject's ability to perceive instructions and perform motor responses.

  (68) Protocols - A detailed, written set of instructions by the EMS Provider medical director, which may include delegated standing medical orders, to guide patient care or the performance of medical procedures as approved.

  (69) Primary EMS provider response area - The geographic area in which an EMS agency routinely provides emergency EMS as agreed upon by a local or county governmental entity or by contract.

  (70) Public safety answering point (PSAP) - The call center responsible for answering calls to an emergency telephone number for ambulance services; sometimes called "public safety access point," or "dispatch center."

  (71) Quality management - Quality assurance, quality improvement, and/or performance improvement activities.

  (72) Regional Advisory Council (RAC) - An organization serving as the Department of State Health Services recognized health care coalition responsible for the development, implementation and maintenance of the regional trauma and emergency health care system within the geographic jurisdiction of the Trauma Service Area. A Regional Advisory Council must maintain §501(c)(3) status.

  (73) Regional EMS/trauma system - A network of healthcare providers within a given trauma service area (TSA) collectively focusing on traumatic injury as a public health problem, based on the given resources within each TSA.

  (74) Regional medical control - Physician supervision for prehospital emergency medical services (EMS) providers in a given trauma service area or other geographic area intended to provide standardized oversight, treatment, and transport guidelines, which should, at minimum, follow the regional advisory council's regional EMS/trauma system plan components related to these issues and 22 Texas Administrative Code, §197.3(relating to Off-line Medical Director).

  (75) Recertification - The procedure for renewal of emergency medical services certification.

  (76) Receiving facility - A facility to which an EMS vehicle may transport a patient who requires prompt continuous medical care.

  (77) Reciprocity - The recognition of certification or privileges granted to an individual from another state or recognized EMS system.

  (78) Relicensure - The procedure for renewal of a paramedic license as described in §157.40 of this title (relating to Paramedic Licensure); the procedure for renewal of an EMS provider license as described in §157.11 of this title.

  (79) Response pending status - The status of an EMS vehicle that just delivered a patient to a final receiving facility, and the dispatch center has another EMS response waiting that EMS vehicle.

  (80) Response ready - When an EMS vehicle is equipped and staffed in accordance with §157.11 of this title (relating to Requirements for a Provider License) and is immediately available to respond to any emergency call 24 hours per day, seven days per week (24/7).

  (81) Scope of practice - The procedures, actions and processes that an EMS personnel are permitted to undertake in keeping with the terms of their professional license or certification and approved by their EMS provider's medical director.

  (82) Severe trauma patient - A person with injuries or potential injuries that require treatment at a tertiary trauma facility. These patients may be identified by an alteration in vital signs and/or level of consciousness or by the presence of significant injuries and shall initiate a system's and/or health care entity's highest level of trauma response including prehospital triage to a designated trauma facility. For performance improvement purposes, these patients are also identified retrospectively by an injury severity score of 15 or above.

  (83) Shall - Mandatory requirements.

  (84) Site survey - An on-site review of a trauma facility applicant to determine if it meets the criteria for a particular level of designation.

  (85) Sole provider - The only licensed emergency medical service provider in a geographically contiguous service area and in which the next closest provider is greater than 20 miles from the limits of the area.

  (86) Specialized emergency medical services vehicle - A vehicle that is designed for responding to and transporting sick or injured persons by any means of transportation other than by standard automotive ground ambulance or rotor or fixed wing air craft and that has sufficient staffing, equipment and supplies to provide for the specialized needs of the patient transported. This category includes, but is not limited to, water craft, off-road vehicles, and specially designed, configured or equipped vehicles used for transporting special care patients such as critical neonatal or burn patients.

  (87) Specialty centers - Entities that care for specific types of patients such as trauma, pediatric, stroke, cardiac hospitals and burn units that have received certification, categorization, verification or other form of recognition by an appropriate agency regarding their capability to definitively treat these types of patients.

  (88) Staffing plan - A document which indicates the overall working schedule patterns of EMS personnel.

  (89) Standard of care - Care equivalent to what any reasonable, prudent person of like certification level would have given in a similar situation, based on locally, regionally and nationally adopted standard emergency medical services curricula as adopted by reference in §157.32 of this title (relating to Emergency Medical Services Training and Course Approval).

  (90) Substation - An EMS provider station location that is not the fixed station and which is likely to provide rapid access to a location to which the EMS vehicle may be dispatched.

  (91) Trauma - An injury or wound to a living body caused by the application of an external force or violence, including burn injuries. Poisonings, near-drownings and suffocations, other than those due to external forces are to be excluded from this definition.

  (92) Trauma facility - A hospital that has successfully completed the designation process, is capable of stabilization and/or definitive treatment of critically injured persons and actively participates in a regional EMS/trauma system.

  (93) Trauma nurse coordinator/trauma program manager - A registered nurse with demonstrated interest, education, and experience in trauma care and who, in partnership with the trauma medical director and hospital administration, is responsible for coordination of trauma care at a designated trauma facility. This coordination should include active participation in the trauma performance improvement program, the authority to positively impact trauma care of trauma patients in all areas of the hospital, and targeted prevention and education activities for the public and health care professionals.

  (94) Trauma patient - Any critically injured person who has been evaluated by a physician, a registered nurse, or emergency medical services personnel, and found to require medical care in a trauma facility based on local, regional or national medical standards.

  (95) Trauma registry - A statewide database which documents and integrates medical and system information related to the provision of trauma care by health care entities.

  (96) Trauma Service Area - An organized geographical area of at least three counties administered by a regional advisory council for the purpose of providing prompt and efficient transportation and/or treatment of sick and injured patients.

  (97) When in service - The period of time when an EMS vehicle is at the scene or when enroute to a facility with a patient.


Source Note: The provisions of this §157.2 adopted to be effective September 1, 2000, 25 TexReg 3749; amended to be effective February 12, 2017, 42 TexReg 430

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