Helicopters

Rangat

Forum Lieutenant
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So, I know you ppl have more air support than in South Africa, but how does your Criteria compare to ours?

Helicopter Dispatch Criteria

Criteria to exclude helicopter mobilization:

CPR in progress
The pt is less than twenty minutes road transport from and appropriate medical facility
Medical Criteria:

Head injuries where:

The GCS is no les than 6 and no more than 12
Clear focal neurological deficit exists regardless of GCS
Initial blood pressure of less than 75 mmHg systolic
Where signs and symptoms indicate spinal injury, or where there is documented neurological injury and road transport exceeds 20 minutes or where extreme terrain prevents safe ground transportation.
4. Patents with respiratory distress despite full supplemental oxygenation.
Amputations:
Above the knee or elbow
Where arterial vascular injury exist
Severe penetrating injury trauma to the head, neck, thorax and/or abdomen with possible involvement of the underlying organs or vascular structures.
Near Drowning
Electrocution with cardiac involvement
Hypothermia (<35 deg Celsius) or hyperthermia (>40 deg Celsius)
Burns:
In adults with 30-80% BSA involvement
In children with 20-80% BSA involvement
Burns to the face with airway involvement
Medical patients where the expertise of the crew is required: Examples include:
Myocardial infarction – Unstable, post resuscitation, life threatening arrhythmia
Refractory Anaphylaxis
Refractory Seizures
Logical Criteria

These are the discretion of the medical director.

Where specialized equipment or expertise (other than routine ALS) carried by the helicopter is required on scene.
Where ALS is required and can not be delivered by road \ in a reasonable period of time.
Where access to the scene is limited but a helicopter can be safely landed.
Mass casualty incidents where the local EMS recourses are greatly exceeded by the number of priority 1 and 2 patients.
Escalation

The helicopter service will escalate the decision to proceed on a primary response to the appropriate assistance company in the event that the distance by air exceeds 150km or the flying time exceeds 45 minutes.

In order to ensure a smooth operation the following Standard Operating Guideline needs to be adhered to.

:D
 

emtbuff

Forum Captain
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We can pretty much put the chopper on standby or have it enroute when ever we deam in necessary. I know that we have had it in route with many cases as we are a small town community hospital and ambulance squad. But the cases where we have had the chopper come in include:

Severe trauma where surgery will be necessary or CT/MRI scans will be needed to detect any other problems.

Peds. It seems alot of our peds that we pick up for either car accidents, or medical conditions that can't be determined in the local hospital get flown out.

Cardiac/Stroke pts.

Burns

We as an ambulance crew alot of times end up having a say in if we would prefer if the pt goes by air. About the only time we really go ALS in the rig is if we have a RN rideing along in the back of the ambulance. And that usually happens when the weather conditions don't warrent the chopper to fly. We have had MCI's and had all three choppers from our area land and take the critical pts for us.
 

FFEMT1764

Devil's Advocate
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We can use the bird anytime for any trauma where we have justification by either injury or mechanism. Medical flight protocol requires on line medical conrol approval, but if you give a good report rarely do they say no, but we have a small band-aid station for a ER.
 

ffemt8978

Forum Vice-Principal
Community Leader
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Helicopters are my FAVORITE ALS units. We use them a lot due to our long transport times. Hell, we've even done a fixed wing to a scene before.
 

FFEMT1764

Devil's Advocate
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I wish we had a fixed wing to use! We have landed all 6 of our regions birds before on 1 call, but hey when you have 6 p1 and 2 p4 pt's the more the merrier right.
 

ffemt8978

Forum Vice-Principal
Community Leader
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This was a two car MVA "T-Bone" at highway speeds. The impact seperated the transmission mount from one of the vehicles and threw it 60 feet. Helos couldn't fly due to weather, but fixed wing was able to beat the weather front and transport one patient.

We used 4 seperate ALS ground units and 3 BLS gound units in addition to the plane on that call.
 
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FFEMT1764

Devil's Advocate
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Our call was 1 car full of intoxicated latinos...lucky us we had clear blue skys and we used 2 of our 4 transports and 2 qrvs, but 3 of the 6 birds had launch to scene times of less than 10 min...I do love overkill when it comes to how many EMS helos one region of a tiny state needs!
 

Jon

Administrator
Community Leader
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my Fire Co had a Cluster-F$%@ several years back where we flew 5 birds, with 3 on the ground at one point. Still holds the county's record for most birds, and ties for most on the ground at once.

I've flown 2 patients this week - one on Saturday night/sunday morning for the Pedistrian struck, and one last night for the lady who was asleep when her apartment burned... possible inhalation burns.

Jon
 

coloradoemt

Forum Asst. Chief
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Our use of Choppers is simply just another step in total pt care. I have landed choppers before as the only EMT on scene simply because it would be better for the pt. I use them often as my only ALS back-up. We do not need to call for medical direction to do this. We have 8 birds at our disposal but the most I have dealt with on one scene was 2.
 

emtd29

Forum Lieutenant
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ffemt8978 said:
Helicopters are my FAVORITE ALS units. We use them a lot due to our long transport times. Hell, we've even done a fixed wing to a scene before.

Just curious as to what kind of scene you had the fixed wing bird at, and where did he land??? Short ground txpt to runway or did he land in the middle of the highway?
 

ffemt8978

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emtd29 said:
Just curious as to what kind of scene you had the fixed wing bird at, and where did he land??? Short ground txpt to runway or did he land in the middle of the highway?

2 car MVA that knocked the transmission out of one of the vehicles and threw it 50 feet. Helos couldn't fly due to incoming storm front, but the fixed wing pilot decided he could make it. We did a ground transport to a local (unmanned) airstrip and met the bird about the time he finished his taxi (long extrication).

Pilot was pleasantly suprised that the runway had lights and asphalt, he was expecting flares and a gravel runway.
 

TTLWHKR

Forum Deputy Chief
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The locals call them for just about everything life threatening, as there are no specialty hospitals w/ in such distance to make a difference. I hear them asking for them all the time on the scanner(s). Locally, they cannot treat CVA's, cardiac problems, trauma, orthopedic injuries, etc. I mean they don't call for a broken arm, or something minor, or every call for chest pain. But it's nice they have the option, with no second questions.
 

mine-rescue-emt

Forum Ride Along
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I work at an underground mine 29 miles from the nearest town, and another 25 miles or so from the nearest hospital. We also have an open pit mine on our site, with 2 intermediate-staffed ambulances. As soon as our surface ambulance is dispatched to the underground area, our local air ambulance service is put on stand-by, and will be launched as soon as we can make a determination of the severity underground. Best case scenario, it will take us 20 minutes to get a miner out of the hole and to one of the heli-pads.
 

medic03

Forum Lieutenant
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I work as a flight medic and I fly almost any and all types of pt's. It all depends on what the vollies call us for but most flights for trauma and CVA's. We do go to a few islands and areas that have no access to hospitals, so I'll fly a diabetic or a chest pain for the vollies beacuse it's faster than getting the Police marine boat out and running. I also do interfacilities but the 911 jobs are more interesting to me. The vollies have a set of protocols that they are suppose to follow that lay out when it's ok to call for the heli, but they are never followed. That's fine by me because I would rather fly than just sit in the hanger waiting
 

Flight-LP

Forum Deputy Chief
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ffemt8978 said:
2 car MVA that knocked the transmission out of one of the vehicles and threw it 50 feet. Helos couldn't fly due to incoming storm front, but the fixed wing pilot decided he could make it. We did a ground transport to a local (unmanned) airstrip and met the bird about the time he finished his taxi (long extrication).

Pilot was pleasantly suprised that the runway had lights and asphalt, he was expecting flares and a gravel runway.


Remind me to never fly with that pilot!!!!!! If a helo can't make it VFR due to weather, I cannot fathom a fixed wing pilot even attempting it. Much less at an unmanned airstrip..................And people wonder why HEMS accident rates are so high...............
 
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