HB 7131, An Act Concerning Financial Aid For Students In Paramedic Certificate Programs
TESTIMONY OF THE CONNECTICUT HOSPITAL ASSOCIATION
SUBMITTED TO THE HIGHER EDUCATION COMMITTEE
Friday, March 7, 2025
The Connecticut Hospital Association (CHA) appreciates this opportunity to submit testimony concerning HB 7131, An Act Concerning Financial Aid For Students In Paramedic Certificate Programs. CHA supports this bill.
Connecticut hospitals and health systems care for patients, strengthen the state’s economy, and support vulnerable communities across the state. Every day, they work to improve healthcare access, affordability, and health equity. Even as they face ongoing challenges, hospitals provide world-class care to everyone who walks through their doors, regardless of their ability to pay. Hospitals also support an exemplary workforce as the largest collective employer in the state, contribute significantly to the state’s economy, and invest in their communities addressing social drivers of health.
One of the ongoing challenges Connecticut continues to face is a shortage of healthcare workers. The shortage is broad, encompassing clinical and nonclinical positions and extending across disciplines. While healthcare workforce shortages existed pre-pandemic, the pandemic exacerbated them both by slowing the educational pipeline for skilled healthcare workers and affecting recruitment and retention, including prehospital, emergency medical services (EMS) personnel such as paramedics.
Paramedics are the most advanced licensure category in EMS for Connecticut and provide comprehensive medical skills to the most acute patients in emergency situations, delivering advanced-level care during interfacility transportation. Paramedics are also currently the only level of prehospital personnel who are allowed to participate in mobile integrated health (MIH) programs. MIH programs utilize mobile resources to deliver care and services to patients in an out-of-hospital environment in coordination with healthcare facilities or other healthcare providers. Through MIH, experienced, licensed paramedics can provide services to patients in their homes or communities, supplementing services already available in some areas of the state and providing them in places where they do not exist.
As Connecticut continues to navigate ongoing workforce shortages, an all-hands-on-deck approach is needed to address these shortages. Effective July 1, 2025, this bill charges the Office of Workforce Strategy (OWS) to: (1) identify several public or private sources of financial aid that are available to a student in each paramedic certificate program approved by the Office of Emergency Medical Services, (2) post a list of such financial aid sources on its internet website, and (3) distribute such list to each such paramedic certificate programs. CHA and its member hospitals support this approach.
Additionally, we encourage the committee to review the Comptroller’s 2025 Healthcare Cabinet Report and its workforce recommendations. CHA supports the report’s recommendations, which call for providing tuition repayment and loan repayment for individuals pursuing careers in healthcare and the creation of a healthcare innovation fund modeled after the successful structure of the Manufacturing Innovation Fund to support the growth of Connecticut’s healthcare workforce needs in in-demand fields, such as respiratory therapy, radiologic technology, pharmacy, and EMS.
Thank you for your consideration of our position. For additional information, contact CHA Government Relations at (203) 294-7301.