Non-Emergency Medical Transportation in Arlington, VA

Where we take Arlington riders

VHC Health on North George Mason Drive is the anchor. It is the county’s hospital and most Arlington trips either start or end there — appointments, imaging, outpatient surgery and discharges.

Azura Surgery Center Arlington and the physical therapy and rehab centers across the county — Carriage Hill, Cherrydale, Carlin Springs Health & Rehabilitation and Regency Care — account for a steady stream of recurring trips.

Washington DC is the difference in Arlington. More than in any other city we serve, Arlington riders are sent across the bridge for their care: MedStar Georgetown, George Washington University Hospital, Sibley Memorial, Howard University Hospital. We hold WMATC authority 3449, which is what a carrier needs to operate across the DC line legally. A company without it either turns the trip down or runs it anyway — and you do not want to find out which at the curb.

Southward we run to Inova Alexandria and Inova Mount Vernon regularly, and we take Arlington riders out to Fairfax for the Inova specialty services.

Choosing your level of service

Four options, and the right one depends on how your rider moves rather than how far they’re going.

Ambulatory is for someone who can walk to and from the vehicle, with a steadying arm if needed. The driver assists at the door and again at the destination.

Wheelchair transportation is for a rider who stays in their chair for the trip. The chair goes up a ramp on our minivans or a hydraulic lift on our full-size vans, and it is secured with a four-point strap system before the vehicle moves. You don’t need to own a wheelchair — we can provide one.

Stretcher is for a rider who can’t sit upright safely for the journey. Common after surgery, during a decline, or when someone is discharged from a hospital to a skilled nursing or rehabilitation facility. Two crew members run every stretcher trip, so there is always a second pair of hands for the transfer at both ends.

Bariatric applies over 300 pounds and uses equipment rated for the weight, with additional crew. We run fewer bariatric vehicles than standard ones, so give us as much notice as you can.

If you’re not sure which applies, call and describe the situation. Getting this right before the vehicle is dispatched matters more than almost anything else about the booking — the wrong vehicle at the door means a delay, and a delay on a medical appointment is rarely just an inconvenience.

For prices, pickup tips and local destinations by service, see our pages on wheelchair transportation in Arlington and stretcher transportation in Arlington.

High-rise pickup in the corridor

Arlington is more vertical than anywhere else we serve, and a wheelchair van in a high-rise is a different problem from a wheelchair van on a driveway.

Garage clearance is the first question. A raised-roof wheelchair van does not fit in every residential garage. Many buildings along the Rosslyn-Ballston corridor post a clearance of six feet six or seven feet, which our vans exceed. That is not a reason the trip can’t happen — it means we pick up at the street entrance or the loading bay rather than inside. Tell us the building and we will know or we will call ahead and find out.

Loading docks and service entrances. Most buildings prefer a vehicle at the service entrance rather than the front covered entrance. Some require it. Some want the front desk notified and the elevator keyed. Fifteen seconds of that information at booking saves fifteen minutes at the door.

The distance from the door to the vehicle matters more than it does in a house. A lobby, a long corridor and a ramp down to a loading bay can be a couple of hundred feet. For an ambulatory rider having a bad day, that is the hard part of the trip, not the drive. Tell us if the rider can’t cover that distance on foot and we’ll bring a chair.

Crystal City and Pentagon City have their own wrinkle: the underground concourses mean the address you know is sometimes not the address a vehicle can reach. Give us the street entrance you actually use.

Dialysis and standing orders

Dialysis is the ride we run most often, and it’s the one where reliability compounds. A patient on a three-day-a-week schedule takes more than 150 trips a year with us. Missing one isn’t a scheduling inconvenience; it’s a clinical event.

Arlington has dialysis centers of its own — U.S. Renal Care Arlington County on Army Navy Drive, DaVita Arlington on 1st Street North and DaVita Pentagon City on South Hayes Street — and riders also travel to DaVita Alexandria Dialysis on Duke Street and the Falls Church and Annandale centers. Tell us the center when you book and we’ll confirm the approach before the first trip rather than on it.

For a recurring schedule we set up a standing order rather than having you rebook every week. You tell us the days, the times and the center once. The trip stays on our schedule, the same crews see the same riders, and they learn the specifics — which door, how long the chair takes to come out, whether the rider needs the vehicle warm before they get in.

Post-dialysis rides run differently from the outbound leg. People come off treatment tired, sometimes lightheaded, occasionally unsteady in a way they weren’t three hours earlier. Our drivers are told to expect that rather than treat it as a surprise, and to give the transfer whatever time it needs.

Booking, coverage and payment

Dispatch answers around the clock at (703) 304-7889. For a routine appointment, a day’s notice is comfortable and more is better, particularly for stretcher or bariatric trips where the vehicle pool is smaller. For facilities scheduling a discharge, we hold to a three-hour lead time.

If the ride is covered by Medicaid, it should cost the rider nothing, and it is booked through the plan’s transportation broker rather than directly with us. Call the transportation number on your Medicaid ID card; the brokers we work with are MTM Health and SafeRide Health. Request H&M Transport specifically when you book your ride. See our Virginia Medicaid transportation guide.

If you’re paying privately or arranging through a facility account, call us directly and we’ll quote the trip before you commit. Pricing depends on level of service, mileage and whether the trip is one-way or round-trip — our full rate card and estimator is published.

Facilities in Arlington — VHC Health’s discharge planners, the skilled nursing and rehab centers, the assisted living communities along the corridor — can set up an account with us and book without quoting each trip individually.

Questions we get from Arlington families

Do you go into Washington DC?

Yes, and for Arlington this is the question that matters most. We hold WMATC authority 3449, the authority a carrier needs to operate across the DC line legally. We run Arlington riders to Georgetown, GW, Sibley and Howard every week.

Will your van fit in my building’s garage?

Often not — a raised-roof wheelchair van is taller than the clearance most residential garages post. It isn’t a problem: we pick up at the street or the loading entrance instead. Tell us the building when you book and we’ll sort the approach in advance.

How far ahead should I book?

A day’s notice is comfortable for a routine appointment. For stretcher or bariatric trips, more if you can. For a hospital discharge, a facility can book with three hours’ notice.

Do you wait during the appointment?

For short appointments — dialysis, imaging, an injection — waiting is often the right call and we’ll price it that way. For anything longer it’s usually better to schedule a return leg. Tell us the expected duration and we’ll advise.

What if the appointment runs late?

Call dispatch and we adjust. For a return leg we generally hold the slot rather than send the vehicle away. A call as soon as you know helps more than a call when you’re ready to leave.

Are you accredited?

Yes — H&M Transport was the first non-emergency medical transportation provider in Virginia to earn NEMTAC accreditation. It covers driver training, vehicle standards, securement procedure and incident handling.

What we can’t take

H&M Transport runs non-emergency medical transportation. We carry people to scheduled medical care and back home again, and the ride itself is transport rather than treatment.

That means there are trips we can’t take. We are not an ambulance service. We don’t provide medical care or monitoring on board, we don’t transport anyone to an emergency room, and we don’t move patients from one hospital to another for a higher level of care. Those are ambulance trips, and they need a crew and a vehicle equipped for them.

If this is a medical emergency, call 911.

If you’re not sure which you need, call us and describe the situation. We would rather tell you to dial 911 than send the wrong vehicle.

Book a ride in Arlington

Arlington, Ballston, Clarendon, Rosslyn, Crystal City, Pentagon City and Shirlington — ambulatory, wheelchair, stretcher and bariatric, seven days a week, with DC crossings covered.

Call dispatch at (703) 304-7889, any hour. If you’d rather start online, use our reservations page and we’ll call you back to confirm the details.