LARGO, Fla. (Nov. 6, 2018) ¬– The Florida Association of Emergency Medical Services (EMS) Educators recognized Sunstar Paramedics’ Anthony Grasso as the 2018 Florida Preceptor of the Year, and Tony Cambone as the 2018 Florida EMS Continuing Educator of the Year. Both Grasso and Cambone were honored for their commitment and excellence in EMS education.
Grasso is a preceptor and field training officer (FTO) with Sunstar Paramedics, and he was honored for his dedication to mentoring St. Petersburg College students. In the last year, Grasso accumulated more than 500 preceptor hours, while consistently receiving excellent reviews from his colleagues and students. In the past year, two of Grasso’s students were hired by Sunstar Paramedics and requested to continue their training under Grasso.
Grasso is an exceptional role model for his consistent commitment to excellence. He maintains a 100 percent score on the quality indicators for patient care that are monitored by Pinellas County over the course of 800 emergency calls. Grasso also holds a perfect overall score on his driving record monitored by Sunstar Paramedics’ driver monitoring system, which shows his commitment to safety.
Cambone is a clinical services coordinator, training center coordinator and continuing education instructor with Sunstar Paramedics, and an instructor for courses through National Association of Emergency Medical Technicians (NAEMT) and American Heart Association. He was honored for developing systems and processes to improve the training provided to EMTs and paramedics who work for Sunstar Paramedics and for 18 fire departments throughout Pinellas County.
In 2018, Cambone oversaw the new advanced cardiovascular life support (ACLS) renewal initiative, where he created and delivered “train the trainer” courses to 60 instructors who trained 1,000 paramedics. In addition, Cambone added a training center section to Sunstar Paramedics’ website to allow paramedics, EMTs and community members to register and pay for continuing medical education classes. He also changed the training center survey system so that each class is surveyed while the class is being completed, which allows for better data collection and analysis. The real-time anonymous feedback led to improvements in course agendas. Sunstar Paramedics was also able to use the feedback to add interactive course review sessions and update equipment.
“We are pleased that Anthony and Tony have been recognized for their vital work in Pinellas County,” said John Peterson, chief operating officer of Sunstar Paramedics. “They have both shown their constant dedication to teaching future paramedics and creating programs that will help them succeed.”
The Florida Association of EMS Educators fosters high-quality EMS education and training for individuals and organizations. The statewide awards recognize those who exemplify excellence in EMS education.
About Sunstar Paramedics:
Sunstar is the 911 ambulance transport service for all Pinellas County residents, employing 725
local residents, and responding to around 520 calls a day. Highly awarded and accredited, Sunstar utilizes state-of-the-art equipment and software, and (along with parent company PatientCare) is an innovator of the industry’s best practices. Sunstar’s people are heavily involved in Pinellas communities, focusing largely on public safety programs for the public and for schools. Sunstar is also a recipient of the Florida Governor’s Sterling Award, the state’s most prestigious award recognizing “role models for organizational performance excellence.” More info at SunstarEMS.com.