Essex-Windsor EMS are handling more calls than ever, even as some key performance indicators are showing signs of improvement.
Essex-Windsor EMS Chief Justin Lammers presented the latest operational status review to Essex County Council on Wednesday, which showed that paramedics responded to more than 68,000 urgent and prompt calls in 2025 - a 4.4 per cent increase over 2024.
The largest jump was in Code 3 calls, meaning a prompt call that requires no lights or sirens, which rose 14 per cent.
While call volumes continue to climb, offload delays at local hospitals saw improvements. Paramedics spent more than 1,000 fewer hours waiting to transfer patients to emergency departments during the first quarter of 2026 compared to the same period last year. Overall offload delays also dropped over 1,300 hours compared with 2024.
Despite these improvements, the report outlined ongoing pressure on the EMS system, where Code Black events - when no ambulances are available to respond to emergencies - increased by 57 per cent compared to 2024.
Code Black minutes in 2025 were 563 compared to 358 minutes in 2024. 111 Code Black minutes have been recorded in 2026 so far between January 1 and May 27.
Lammers says improvements to offload delays is due to different initiatives in place at the local hospitals.
“Prioritizing EMS when they arrive, but also we’ve done some good work with our Fit to Sit program, where if you come in by ambulance, if you call an ambulance and you’re transported to the hospital and you’re deemed low acuity, you go to the waiting room. And that’s a joint partnership not just in our region but across the province; it’s a joint partnership between us and the hospitals, and we’re seeing some good success with that.”
He says the Code Black minutes are concerning, but often there are multiple factors contributing to it.
“Sometimes you can get a cardiac arrest, a significant trauma, and a stroke at the same time, all transported to the hospital, and then it’s tough for the hospital to deal with all of those at that same time because they are resource-intensive cases. So that can slow things down. Having enough ambulances on the road, if we’re down-staffed that’s a bit of a struggle.”
Lammers says the service is expecting improvements when the new Medical Priority Dispatch System launches in mid-September, allowing resources to be assigned more efficiently based on the severity of calls.
He says other areas that have launched this system have seen a decrease in light and siren responses.
“Which then allows us to keep our resources available on the road and balance out the spikes in volume. So we look to our colleagues up in Simcoe; they dropped the amount of lights and sirens responses significantly. So, when we look at balancing out the load, the work remains; it doesn’t get rid of the work that paramedics are doing; that workload remains, but it allows us to spread it out.”
The report also highlighted staffing challenges. EMS hired 23 part-time paramedics last year, but retirements, resignations, and leaves of absence continued to impact workforce capacity.
To help address this growing demand, Essex-Windsor EMS plans to launch two new Rapid Response Units.
The single-paramedic vehicles will be dispatched to the region’s most critical emergencies, including cardiac arrests, choking incidents, and patients who have stopped breathing.