Pre-Hospital Emergency Services With Emphasis on Traffic Accidents: A Case Study in Mashhad, Iran

Abstract

Background: Pre-hospital emergency service is an important part of any health care system. The present study was conducted to evaluate the pre-hospital Emergency Services 115 of Mashhad City, Iran with emphasis on response to traffic accidents during 2012-2013. Materials and Methods:In this descriptive cross-sectional and applied study, 53685 files of traffic accident victims related to 42240 missions accomplished during 2012-2013 were evaluated. The study data were collected by referring to the statistics unit of the Center for Medical Emergencies and Accidents. To determine the services performed for the victims, a researcher-designed checklist was used. Descriptive statistics were performed to analyze the raw data. All analyses were done by Excel 2013. Results:The average (SD) age of traffic accident victims was 29.5(15.69) years. The frequency of accidents was more in September, on Thursdays, and between 6 and 9 PM. About 70% of missions ended with the transfer the injured to hospitals and average (SD) response times were 8:24 (2:35) minutes in 2012 and 9:01 (2:46) minutes in 2013. The frequency of treatment and dispatch to hospitals by the resident physician were reported as 70.51% in 2012 and 69.7% in 2013. The most frequent action taken were injections (96%) and then stabilizing body limbs (60%). Conclusion:Considering the findings of this research, the response time was longer than the standard time. Regarding the performed services, shortcomings in manpower and ambulance equipment can reduce the effectiveness of missions. Therefore, Emergency Center 115 of Mashhad should carry out some interventions to resolve shortages in manpower and equipment to reach standard conditions and provide better services.

Identification and Prioritization of Key Components Influencing Prehospital Emergency Related to Preventable Road Traffic Injuries Deaths in Iran; A Delphi Study

“…Some studies have been conducted in general and some of them are partly due to causes that disrupt pre-hospital emergency services and lead to death. The study aimed to investigate the pre-hospital emergencies of traffic accidents in developing and developed countries, increasing the speed of service and reducing the response time, equipping ambulances and facilities, continuing education of staff employed in ambulances, using manpower with a level High professionalism and job satisfaction are among the factors that can be used to reduce the number of deaths and disabilities caused by RTIs [25]. In a study aimed at the role of pre-hospital emergencies in the provision of medical services, Attention to three trained human resources, equipment and response time are considered as the main infrastructure for the performance of the pre-hospital emergency, but for its impact on preventable mortality, other dimensions should be analyzed in detail [26].…”

Innovation in the use of motor ambulance for prehospital emergency care

“…[ 18 ] The average response time in Mashhad, another crowded Iranian city with heavy traffic, was between 8 and 9 min in 2012 and 2013. [ 19 ] According to reports by the Norwegian Ministry of Health and Social affairs, the average response time should be 8 min in cities and 25 min in rural areas for 90% of emergency phone calls. [ 20 ] In the present study, the use of motor ambulances reduced response time significantly to 14 min and 13 s. Nonetheless, it is not up to national or international standards.…”

Development and validation of moral distress scale in pre-hospital emergency service providers

“…To carry out EFA, accordingly, ten subjects for each item were considered (Hanna, 2004;Ebrahimipour et al, 2017;Keykaleh and Sohrabizadeh, 2019). Given the possibility of missing some subjects during the study, 15 EMTs were considered for each item.…”

“…Therefore, the urgent need to design a tool to assess pre-hospital MD makes sense. Further, Iran is a country with a source of natural disasters such as earthquakes, floods, forest fires and also road accidents which need more prehospital services (Ebrahimipour et al, 2017;Keykaleh and Sohrabizadeh, 2019). Moreover, MD scales need to be culturally sensitive to carefully identify and measure moral issues, and because of the effect of cultural and social factors on the norms and values of each community, the use of indigenous and native scales has been recommended (Montagnino and Ethier, 2007;Burston and Tuckett, 2013;Motevallian et al, 2008;Vaziri et al, 2015;Soleimani et al, 2016).…”