Dataset Information

Helicopter-based emergency medical services for a sparsely populated region: A study of 42,500 dispatches.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The Helicopter Emergency Medical Service (HEMS) in Norway is operated day and night, despite challenging geography and weather. In Western Norway, three ambulance helicopters, with a rapid response car as an alternative, cover close to 1 million inhabitants in an area of 45,000 km(2) . Our objective was to assess patterns of emergency medical problems and treatments in HEMS in a geographically large, but sparsely populated region.

Methods

Data from all HEMS dispatches during 2004-2013 were assessed retrospectively. Information was analyzed with respect to patient treatment and characteristics, in addition to variations in services use during the day, week, and seasons.

Results

A total of 42,456 dispatches were analyzed. One third of the patients encountered were severely ill or injured, and two thirds of these received advanced treatment. Median activation time and on-scene time in primary helicopter missions were 5 and 11 min, respectively. Most patients (95%) were reached within 45 min by helicopter or rapid response car. Patterns of use did not change. More than one third of all dispatches were declined or aborted, mostly due to no longer medical indication, bad weather conditions, or competing missions.

Conclusion

One third of the patients encountered were severely ill or injured, and more than two thirds of these received advanced treatment. HEMS use did not change over the 10-year period, however HEMS use peaked during daytime, weekends, and the summer. More than one third of all dispatches were declined or aborted.

SUBMITTER: Osteras O

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5064740 | biostudies-literature | 2016 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

Helicopter-based emergency medical services for a sparsely populated region: A study of 42,500 dispatches.

Østerås Ø Ø Brattebø G G Heltne J-K JK

Acta anaesthesiologica Scandinavica 20151221 5

<h4>Background</h4>The Helicopter Emergency Medical Service (HEMS) in Norway is operated day and night, despite challenging geography and weather. In Western Norway, three ambulance helicopters, with a rapid response car as an alternative, cover close to 1 million inhabitants in an area of 45,000 km(2) . Our objective was to assess patterns of emergency medical problems and treatments in HEMS in a geographically large, but sparsely populated region.<h4>Methods</h4>Data from all HEMS dispatches d ...[more]

PMID: 26810562

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Project description:BackgroundSome emergency departments use triage scales, such as the Canadian Triage and Acuity Scale and Japan Urgent Stroke Triage Score, to detect life-threatening situations. However, these protocols have not been used for aeromedical services. Therefore, we investigated the factors predicting these life-threatening situations in aeromedical services as a pilot study for establishing the protocol.MethodWe retrospectively evaluated helicopter emergency medical service cases from 1 April 2015 to 31 March 2020 at Gifu University Hospital using the mission records. We only evaluated cases dealing with suggested internal medicine issues. We excluded cases influenced by external factors such as trauma or cases that included hospital-to-hospital transportation, focusing only on prehospital care. We evaluated the validity of the medical emergencies based on the needs for emergency interventions and hospital admission and of the suggested diagnoses and associated risk factors.ResultA total of 451 cases were suitable for inclusion in the study. In the analysis for all emergency calls, 235 (52.11%) cases needed emergency intervention and 300 (64.4%) required hospital admission. The suggested diagnosis was valid for 261 (57.87%) cases. After the first assessment by emergency medical technicians, 75 cases were removed. Analysis after this first assessment found that 52.31% cases required emergency intervention, 70.26% needed admission, and the suggested diagnosis was valid for 69.41% of cases. In the analysis of emergency calls, the multivariate analysis of some key variables identified age, playing sports, and gasping as risk factors for emergency intervention. Hospital admission risk factors included being age only. The suggested diagnosis was valid only for sports situations. In the analysis after the first assessment by an emergency medical technician, risk factors for emergency intervention included being age being male, playing sports, and gasping, and those for hospital admission was being age, being male, and experiencing stroke symptoms and/or disturbance of consciousness. The suggested diagnosis was valid only for sports situations.ConclusionSome 'second' keywords/phrases predict medical emergencies. Therefore, the dispatch commander should gather these keyword/phrases to assess.

Project description:Despite numerous studies on prehospital airway management, results are difficult to compare due to inconsistent or heterogeneous data. The objective of this study was to assess advanced airway management from international physician-staffed helicopter emergency medical services.We collected airway data from 21 helicopter emergency medical services in Australia, England, Finland, Hungary, Norway and Switzerland over a 12-month period. A uniform Utstein-style airway template was used for collecting data.The participating services attended 14,703 patients on primary missions during the study period, and 2,327 (16 %) required advanced prehospital airway interventions. Of these, tracheal intubation was attempted in 92 % of the cases. The rest were managed with supraglottic airway devices (5 %), bag-valve-mask ventilation (2 %) or continuous positive airway pressure (0.2 %). Intubation failure rates were 14.5 % (first-attempt) and 1.2 % (overall). Cardiac arrest patients showed significantly higher first-attempt intubation failure rates (odds ratio: 2.0; 95 % CI: 1.5-2.6; p?<?0.001) compared to non-cardiac arrest patients. Complications were recorded in 13 %, with recognised oesophageal intubation being the most frequent (25 % of all patients with complications). For non-cardiac arrest patients, important risk predictors for first-attempt failure were patient age (a non-linear association) and administration of sedatives (reduced failure risk). The patient's sex, provider's intubation experience, trauma type (patient category), indication for airway intervention and use of neuromuscular blocking agents were not risk factors for first-attempt intubation failure.Advanced airway management in physician-staffed prehospital services was performed frequently, with high intubation success rates and low complication rates overall. However, cardiac arrest patients showed significantly higher first-attempt failure rates compared to non-cardiac arrest patients. All failed intubations were handled successfully with a rescue device or surgical airway.www.clinicaltrials.gov NCT01502111 . Registered 22 December 2011.

Project description:BackgroundThe effective treatment of airway compromise in trauma and non-trauma patients is important. Hypoxia and hypotension are predictors of negative patient outcomes and increased mortality, and may be important quality indicators of care provided by emergency medical services. Excluding cardiac arrests, critical trauma and non-trauma patients remain the two major groups to which helicopter emergency medical services (HEMS) are dispatched. Several studies describe the impact of pre-hospital hypoxia or hypotension on trauma patients, but few studies compare this in trauma and non-trauma patients. The primary aim was to describe the incidence of pre-hospital hypoxia and hypotension in the two groups receiving pre-hospital tracheal intubation (TI) by physician-staffed HEMS.MethodsData were collected prospectively over a 12-month period, using a uniform Utstein-style airway template. Twenty-one physician-staffed HEMS in Europe and Australia participated. We compared peripheral oxygen saturation and systolic blood pressure before and after definitive airway management. Data were analysed using Cochran-Mantel-Haenszel methods and mixed-effects models.ResultsEight hundred forty three trauma patients and 422 non-trauma patients receiving pre-hospital TI were included. Non-trauma patients had significantly lower predicted mean pre-intervention SpO2 compared to trauma patients. Post-intervention and admission SpO2 for the two groups were comparable. However, 3% in both groups were still hypoxic at admission. For hypotension, the differences between the groups were less prominent. However, 9% of trauma and 10% of non-trauma patients were still hypotensive at admission. There was no difference in short-term survival between trauma (97%) and non-trauma patients (95%). Decreased level of consciousness was the most frequent indication for TI, and was associated with increased survival to hospital (cOR 2.8; 95% CI: 1.4-5.4).ConclusionsOur results showed that non-trauma patients had a higher incidence of hypoxia before TI than trauma patients, but few were hypoxic at admission. The difference for hypotension was less prominent, but one in ten patients were still hypotensive at admission. Further investigations are needed to identify reversible causes that may be corrected to improve haemodynamics in the pre-hospital setting. We found high survival rates to hospital in both groups, suggesting that physician-staffed HEMS provide high-quality emergency airway management in trauma and non-trauma patients.Trial registrationClinicaltrials.gov Identifier: NCT01502111 . Registered 22 Desember 2011.

Project description:BackgroundDespite evidence of benefit after injury, helicopter emergency medical services (HEMS) overtriage remains high. Scene and transfer overtriage are distinct processes. Our objectives were to identify geographic variation in overtriage and patient-level predictors, and determine if overtriage impacts population-level outcomes.MethodsPatients 16 years or older undergoing scene or interfacility HEMS in the Pennsylvania Trauma Outcomes Study were included. Overtriage was defined as discharge within 24 hours of arrival. Patients were mapped to zip code, and rates of overtriage were calculated. Hot spot analysis identified regions of high and low overtriage. Mixed-effects logistic regression determined patient predictors of overtriage. High and low overtriage regions were compared for population-level injury fatality rates. Analyses were performed for scene and transfer patients separately.ResultsA total of 85,572 patients were included (37.4% transfers). Overtriage was 5.5% among scene and 11.8% among transfer HEMS (p < 0.01). Hot spot analysis demonstrated geographic variation in high and low overtriage for scene and transfer patients. For scene patients, overtriage was associated with distance (odds ratio [OR], 1.03; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.01-1.06 per 10 miles; p = 0.04), neck injury (OR, 1.27; 95% CI, 1.01-1.60; p = 0.04), and single-system injury (OR, 1.37; 95% CI, 1.15-1.64; p < 0.01). For transfer patients, overtriage was associated with rurality (OR, 1.64; 95% CI, 1.22-2.21; p < 0.01), facial injury (OR, 1.22; 95% CI, 1.03-1.44; p = 0.02), and single-system injury (OR, 1.35; 95% CI, 1.18-2.19; p < 0.01). For scene patients, high overtriage was associated with higher injury fatality rate (coefficient, 1.72; 95% CI, 1.68-1.76; p < 0.01); low overtriage was associated with lower injury fatality rate (coefficient, -0.73; 95% CI, -0.78 to -0.68; p < 0.01). For transfer patients, high overtriage was not associated with injury fatality rate (p = 0.53); low overtriage was associated with lower injury fatality rate (coefficient, -2.87; 95% CI, -4.59 to -1.16; p < 0.01).ConclusionGeographic overtriage rates vary significantly for scene and transfer HEMS, and are associated with population-level outcomes. These findings can help guide targeted performance improvement initiatives to reduce HEMS overtriage.Level of evidenceTherapeutic, level IV.

Project description:BackgroundComparison of services and identification of factors important for favourable patient outcomes in emergency medical services (EMS) is challenging due to different organization and quality of data. The purpose of the present study was to evaluate the feasibility of physician-staffed EMS (p-EMS) to collect patient and system level data by using a consensus-based template.MethodsThe study was an international multicentre observational study. Data were collected according to a template for uniform reporting of data from p-EMS using two different data collection methods; a standard and a focused data collection method. For the standard data collection, data were extracted retrospectively for one year from all FinnHEMS bases and for the focused data collection, data were collected prospectively for six weeks from four selected Norwegian p-EMS bases. Completeness rates for the two data collection methods were then compared and factors affecting completeness rates and template feasibility were evaluated. Standard Chi-Square, Fisher's Exact Test and Mann-Whitney U Test were used for group comparison of categorical and continuous data, respectively, and Kolomogorov-Smirnov test for comparison of distributional properties.ResultsAll missions with patient encounters were included, leaving 4437 Finnish and 128 Norwegian missions eligible for analysis. Variable completeness rates indicated that physiological variables were least documented. Information on pain and respiratory rate were the most frequently missing variables with a standard data collection method and systolic blood pressure was the most missing variable with a focused data collection method. Completeness rates were similar or higher when patients were considered severely ill or injured but were lower for missions with short patient encounter. When a focused data collection method was used, completeness rates were higher compared to a standard data collection method.ConclusionsWe found that a focused data collection method increased data capture compared to a standard data collection method. The concept of using a template for documentation of p-EMS data is feasible in physician-staffed services in Finland and Norway. The greatest deficiencies in completeness rates were evident for physiological parameters. Short missions were associated with lower completeness rates whereas severe illness or injury did not result in reduced data capture.

Dataset Information

Helicopter-based emergency medical services for a sparsely populated region: A study of 42,500 dispatches.

Background

Methods

Results

Conclusion

Publications

Helicopter-based emergency medical services for a sparsely populated region: A study of 42,500 dispatches.

Similar Datasets

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