Asthmatic Girl Dies: Awareness in the community
BY
Dr Satinder kaur, Dr Sunil Choudhary
(Authors are from Emergency Department Max hospital Saket)
Death of a School girl Akriti reported, could be due to Cardiac arrest or Severe Respiratory arrest but it raises Many concerns from Emergency Medicine point of view besides looking at the other issues involved.
We need to review the approach to a Medical Emergency in a School or any public place which needs to be more standardized and protocol based and it requires more awareness not only in school staff but also in the community.
1-Reported response of the school staff not to call the ambulance in case of a Medical Emergency shows the ignorance of public or the community about the importance of Emergency Medical services available in the city or area.
The best approach would be to call for the nearest hospital Ambulance available than waiting or wasting time for any other mode of transport. Ambulance not only transports a patient faster to a hospital than any other mode but also is equipped with the life saving equipment, medications, oxygen and also qualified Emergency Medical personnel. Importance of an ambulance picking up a patient is also based on the fact that the treatment starts right there in the ambulance the moment patient is in. That significantly saves the time consumed on reaching the hospital by any other mode of transport. Evidence based studies done on the Emergency Medical service providers in India shows that ambulance response time to a Medical emergency falls as short as five to nine minutes. Ambulance has a free access on the road when we talk about traffic congestion and Traffic lights on the way in a metropolitan city like New Delhi.
2-The paramedical/medical personnel employed at such places needs to be trained in the Emergency life support or basic life support and advanced life support (BLS/ACLS).There are standard life saving skill(BLS,ACLS,Heart saver) courses available at many centers in our Country.
Authorities of Community and public places like schools or colleges need to be more proactive in getting their Medical staff trained in these life support skills or stressing on having a person trained and skilled in Emergency medicine.
3-There is a great need to train the school teachers, staff and children in life saving skills so that they act as first responders in case of a medical emergency as waiting for a medical person to arrive.
4-Our initiative to prevent more deaths like this can be achieved by reaching out to the community and public so that they can be made aware of not only the Emergency medical services available in their vicinity but also to train them in Similar Life saving skills. We as health care providers have a major role to play in this regard.
Govt authorities also need to be sensitive to such unfortunate incidents and come forward to work on making the public and community places more safe so that in future all of us together save more and more lives!
Dr Satinder kaur, Dr Sunil Choudhary
(Authors are from Emergency Department Max hospital Saket)
Death of a School girl Akriti reported, could be due to Cardiac arrest or Severe Respiratory arrest but it raises Many concerns from Emergency Medicine point of view besides looking at the other issues involved.
We need to review the approach to a Medical Emergency in a School or any public place which needs to be more standardized and protocol based and it requires more awareness not only in school staff but also in the community.
1-Reported response of the school staff not to call the ambulance in case of a Medical Emergency shows the ignorance of public or the community about the importance of Emergency Medical services available in the city or area.
The best approach would be to call for the nearest hospital Ambulance available than waiting or wasting time for any other mode of transport. Ambulance not only transports a patient faster to a hospital than any other mode but also is equipped with the life saving equipment, medications, oxygen and also qualified Emergency Medical personnel. Importance of an ambulance picking up a patient is also based on the fact that the treatment starts right there in the ambulance the moment patient is in. That significantly saves the time consumed on reaching the hospital by any other mode of transport. Evidence based studies done on the Emergency Medical service providers in India shows that ambulance response time to a Medical emergency falls as short as five to nine minutes. Ambulance has a free access on the road when we talk about traffic congestion and Traffic lights on the way in a metropolitan city like New Delhi.
2-The paramedical/medical personnel employed at such places needs to be trained in the Emergency life support or basic life support and advanced life support (BLS/ACLS).There are standard life saving skill(BLS,ACLS,Heart saver) courses available at many centers in our Country.
Authorities of Community and public places like schools or colleges need to be more proactive in getting their Medical staff trained in these life support skills or stressing on having a person trained and skilled in Emergency medicine.
3-There is a great need to train the school teachers, staff and children in life saving skills so that they act as first responders in case of a medical emergency as waiting for a medical person to arrive.
4-Our initiative to prevent more deaths like this can be achieved by reaching out to the community and public so that they can be made aware of not only the Emergency medical services available in their vicinity but also to train them in Similar Life saving skills. We as health care providers have a major role to play in this regard.
Govt authorities also need to be sensitive to such unfortunate incidents and come forward to work on making the public and community places more safe so that in future all of us together save more and more lives!
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