Pre-Hospital Emergency Medical Care Services in Sri Lanka: A Review Article
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.59573/emsj.8(6).2024.24Ключові слова:
Pre-hospital emergency services, Community emergencies, Patient outcomes, Early intervention, Critical moments, Trauma casesАнотація
Pre-hospital emergency services are vital in managing community emergencies, shaping patient outcomes and hospital presentations. Early intervention during critical moments prevents poor outcomes like death or prolonged recovery. Involving multiple agencies, this system addresses trauma and non-trauma cases, mitigating socioeconomic impacts such as lost productivity due to illness or injury. Pre-hospital emergency care involves three key groups: bystanders providing immediate aid, ambulance providers offering advanced care, and hospital teams delivering definitive treatment. In Sri Lanka, evaluating the second responder system's effectiveness is crucial. Improving infrastructure, practices, and collaboration can enhance emergency care, ensuring better outcomes and prioritizing public health and safety. Sri Lanka's pre-hospital emergency care system faces key gaps, including insufficient first-responder training, limited ambulance access, and inadequate emergency medical technician (EMT) staffing and training. Delays in response times, unsafe practices, and poor hospital coordination further hinder care. Critical issues include ineffective resource prioritization, incomplete record-keeping, reliance on direct medical oversight, and unaddressed staff burnout. Operational deficiencies, such as lack of time monitoring and clinical quality indicators, exacerbate the problem. Additionally, there is limited research on emergency care and no coordinated air or water evacuation services. Addressing these gaps through training, better resource allocation, improved coordination, and research can enhance the system's quality and efficiency, ensuring optimal patient outcomes.
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