Reference no: EM133617772

Like just about everything in EMS, all of the resources available to us have their purpose and usefulness, if utilized appropriately. There is most assuredly a time and a place for air medical and it is definitely worth the risk. Those of us who work in more rural areas have first-hand knowledge of this. Some patients live so far out in the county that it is a significantly faster transport time to the hospital to go by air than ground. This is extremely crucial in calls where seconds matter, like cerebral vascular injuries and myocardial infarct. In my county, the closest level 1 and 2 trauma centers are over 2 hours away for some patients. Air medical is about a 30 min. maximum flight time from anywhere in my county. The use of properly marked PELA sites helps minimize any scene risks.

With all that being said, there always these "cowboy medics" who always do the extreme because it looks cool. Patients are being needlessly flown out and there needs to be better protocols in place to prevent this, possible even the use of medical control approval to fly. There is also the laziness factor. For a lot of services, the closest appropriate facility may be a long drive by ground. Some medics have a tendency to call for air medical because they do not want to make the drive there and back, especially near end of shift.

The easiest way to reduce the risk, is to reduce the amount of instances air medical is used in the first place. The rest is down to proper management and training of road crews and their transport decisions.