Reinventing Rural Healthcare: Inside Maine’s Community Paramedicine Revolution

Maine’s rural communities have a healthcare problem — too few providers, too much distance, and too many people falling through the cracks. But what if the solution was already parked in your town, sirens off, waiting for the next call?

In this episode, Jonathan Bush sits down with Dr. Jonathan Busko (emergency physician and EMS innovator), Dr. Charles Burger (primary care pioneer), and Jeff Brown (systems safety consultant turned healthcare reformer) to talk about a game-changing idea: community paramedicine.

It’s a model that trains EMTs and paramedics to do more than respond to emergencies — from checking meds and following up after hospital visits to spotting home hazards and facilitating telehealth. The result?

• Lower costs per patient visit
• Earlier intervention for high-risk patients
• New career pathways that keep healthcare talent in rural towns

They dig into how Maine is making community paramedicine legal, what it will take to make it normal, and why the collapse of primary care might be our chance to build something better.

This isn’t just about saving rural hospitals — it’s about designing a system that keeps people healthier, closer to home, and out of the ER. And if Maine gets it right, the rest of the country will be watching.

Listen to the full conversation now on Maine For Keeps, available wherever you get your podcasts.

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