If you ask Parkland Ambulance Assistant Director Kelly Straf what’s changed over 20 years, he’ll tell you it’s the people.
That’s not a bad thing. He doesn’t mean employee turnover, or a deterioration in personnel. He means there’s a lot more of them.
“When I started we have few staff and few ambulances,” said Straf, who first Parkland in Spring 1998 and has been with the company ever since.
“The company started off very small with humble beginnings, and we’ve grown into what we really have become today, which is a very busy, very in-depth operational service for Prince Albert and our area.”
On Thursday, Nov. 21, Parkland will celebrate their five decade journey since those humble beginnings with their 50th anniversary. As a longtime employee, Straf said the anniversary is “a huge landmark,” but it didn’t happen by accident.
Parkland Ambulance celebrates
“We have a great team here,” he said. “The company really focuses and has grown so much. We’ve enhanced our training, our services, our patient care settings, (and) our equipment.
“I think one of the biggest things is we’re appreciated so much by the company itself. Every staff member is really given an opportunity for their voice to be heard…. I think things like that make it a place where a person can work for a long time and you feel like you can grow and thrive in that sort of environment.”
Parkland Ambulance may be a Prince Albert staple, but its roots are in Blaine Lake. In 1957, a man named Michael Dutchak was involved in an rollover when the car brakes locked going around a corner. At the time, the town did not have an ambulance service, so the injured were driven to Saskatoon in a station wagon. The experience convinced Dutchak to provide ambulance services in the town and district.
Eventually his children, Barry and Wayne, got involved in the business. The two brothers moved to Prince Albert on Nov. 21, 1974, and started Parkland Ambulance. They chose the name to celebrate the area’s natural beauty.
The equipment was simple and sparse, a far cry from the extensive training courses and equipment upgrades Parkland personnel have access to today. For long-serving employees, the extra equipment and training is a big part of what’s convinced them to stay with the company.
Parkland Ambulance staff members pose for the camera in this undated photo.
In 1974, Parkland Ambulance could provide basic first aid and drive fast to the hospital. Today, paramedics bring the emergency room to your front door when they pull up in an ambulance.
“The ambulance in 1974 was more a vehicle to get the sick and injured to the doctor at a hospital,” Parkland Ambulance Care Ltd. spokesperson Lyle Karasiuk wrote in an email to the Daily Herald. “There was not much equipment and not a lot of additional training…. As time progressed, increased training, new vehicle designs, and less reliance on a nurse or a doctor evolved the paramedic profession into a self-regulating professional body it is today.”
“I can remember from where we started until now, every year or couple of years we’d always have the latest model of equipment, whether it be a cardiac monitor or a new version of IV cathlon, whatever would make our jobs easier,” said Brody Anderson, an Advance Care and Community Paramedic who has spent 20 years with Parkland. “That’s something that I think contributes to our success.”
Anderson and staff welcome the extra equipment and training, because it’s not the only thing that’s growing. Calls for service have shot up since Anderson started two decades ago. They answered more than 18,000 in 2023 alone. He said the company has adapted by adding more staff and more ambulances.
The company now has 11 ambulances, more than 100 employees, and two facilities, both of which are larger than the original garage on Second Avenue West.
“It’s kind of difficult to put in to words, especially for people that don’t work in healthcare, the demand of being able to respond for someone who needs help, and then within 30 minutes do it all over again,” Anderson said.
“I think our success is heavily tied into our leadership team being able to put the right people in the right … spots to make sure that we don’t have any holes in the way that we do our business, and our business is helping people.”
“A place like Parkland Ambulance really strives to be innovative and move forward keeping up with the latest in medical technology, equipment, and training,” Straf added.
“We’re always moving forward to provide the absolute best in patient care for those in the community that we served.”
Since its founding, Parkland Ambulance has taken home a number of awards, including the Samuel McLeod Business of the Year Award in 2014, and the Boreal Health Care Foundation Inaugural Collaborative Care Award in 2024.
@kerr_jas • jason.kerr@paherald.sk.ca
