Systematic reporting to improve the emergency medical response to major incidents: a pilot study

Abstract

BackgroundMajor incidents affect us globally, and are occurring with increasing frequency. There is still no evidence-based standard regarding the best medical emergency response to major incidents. Currently, reports on major incidents are non-standardised and variable in quality. This pilot study examines the first systematic reports from a consensus-based, freely accessible database, aiming to identify how descriptive analysis of reports submitted to this database can be used to improve the major incident response.MethodsMajorincidentreporting.net is a website collecting reports on major incidents using a standardised template. Data from these reports were analysed to compare the emergency response to each incident.ResultsData from eight reports showed that effective triage by experienced individuals and the use of volunteers for transport were notable successes of the major incident response. Inadequate resources, lack of a common triage system, confusion over command and control and failure of communication were reported failures. The following trends were identified: Fires had the slowest times for several aspects of the response and the only three countries to have a single dialling number for all three emergency services had faster response times. Helicopter Emergency Medical services (HEMS) were used for transport and treatment in rural locations and for triage and treatment in urban locations. In two incidents, a major incident was declared before the arrival of the first Emergency Medical Services (EMS) personnel.ConclusionThis study shows that we can obtain relevant data from major incidents by using systematic reporting. Though the sample size from this pilot study is not large enough to draw any specific conclusions it illustrates the potential for future analyses. Identified lessons could be used to improve the emergency medical response to major incidents.

Traffic police officers’ experience of post-crash care to road traffic injury victims: a qualitative study in Tanzania”

“…Describing the initial interventions without mentioning application of safety principles, as was the case in many interviews in the present study, indicates a lack of proper knowledge and skills for providing care to RTI victims on the part of traffic police. Poor knowledge and skills in regard to the provision of care to RTI victims by first responders has been demonstrated in other studies to be the main reason for inappropriate intervention during care provision [22, 33]. This situation calls for immediate remedies; otherwise, the police officers who are first at the scene will continue to be of no help to victims, except to rush them to the hospital with poor outcomes afterward [34].…”

“…During phase three (May–June 2018), three FGDs were conducted; two FGDs had 10 participants while the third had 11 participants. Participants were selected from traffic police officers who had participated in a recent survey study [22]. Those traffic police officers who said they had cared for more than six trauma patients in the previous year were selected as key informants for the study.…”

“…Despite the role of the police as key first responders in post-crash care, evidence shows poor outcomes for victims who receive direct physical care from police before reaching the hospital [21]. The findings of a recent study show that these poor outcomes are due to poor knowledge about post-crash care provision and poor post-crash care skills [22]. Although the study found that 99.1% of officers had a positive attitude toward caring for RTI victims, the officers reported performing many incorrect interventions during immediate post-crash care that could endanger victims’ lives.…”

Senior ambulance officers in Swedish emergency medical services: a qualitative study of perceptions and experiences of a new management role in challenging incidents

“…11 12 The PML system means that the personnel in the first arriving ambulance at the scene will assume the prehospital medical management, including roles such as the ambulance incident officer (AIO) and the medical incident officer (MIO), which have been shown to be challenging in many ways during an MI. 13 The MIO is the officer with the highest medical competence and is responsible for medical decisions regarding patient triage and treatment. The MIO should at least be a registered nurse.…”

Correction to: Systematic reporting to improve the emergency medical response to major incidents: a pilot study

“…The original article [ 1 ] contains an error whereby all authors’ names were mistakenly interchanged. The original article has now been corrected to present the authors’ names correctly.…”