Trauma in the air Victims wait for help

[Ronald Gross]

You can't argue with the NTSB data, but you failed to look at crash statistics and patient/crew mortality for ground transport.  That would probably shed a completely different light on oyur argument; in fact it would send it into a tail spin.  I will refer you to a website http://www.objectivesafety.net., and specifically a presentation on that site http://www.objectivesafety.net/2007TRB-SymposiumHO.pdf.  Nadine Levick is a remarkable Aussie who has made the U.S. her home.  Her site will blow you away as you look at the alleged safety of our EMS ground transport systems.  

And as to your quote, "It takes 15 minutes to assemble the crew in the best of circumstances and get them on board (civilian practice requires "cold" boarding and disembarkment). It takes at least 5 minutes for the pre-flight check before you can get the rotors turning."  In fact, our aircraft are IN THE AIR - on average - in EIGHT (8) minutes, so I think you best rethink your numbers.  You also best check the requirements re: cold boarding of crews.  And in fact there is no such requirement for loading patient(s) in the field.  With numbers you quoted, perhaps that is the real reason that you service folded...  ;-)

Be safe,
Ron

>>> <bensonblues at comcast.net> 4/30/2007 8:10 PM >>>
Of all the chatter about waiting times, efficiency of air transport, ad nauseum, no one has addressed the risk involved as well as cost involved. Let's look at some facts: 

Helicoptor medical transport is very expensive and highly overutilized in the US. (I was a flight nurse for two years at the Detroit Medical Center, '80 - '82, and that is why the program was discontinued). Further, it is dangerous: Crash/fatalities increase 3-fold in the night (lots of nighttime in New Jersy) and 8-fold in bad weather (New Jersey ain't no Key West). NTSB records of EMS helicopter crashes between '83, and '05 revealed 184 occupants died in 182 EMS helicopter crashes. One in four EMS helicopters is likely to crash during 15 years of service. The death rate for EMS flight crew members is 20 times the rate of all U.S. workers.

One last thing: Look at the transport times a little more realistically. It takes 15 minutes to assemble the crew in the best of circumstances and get them on board (civilian practice requires "cold" boarding and disembarkment). It takes at least 5 minutes for the pre-flight check before you can get the rotors turning. Then the flight time (? minutes) then landing - which requires a secured scene. Then you have to shut the thing off, then get out and go to your patient, do what you need to do, then get the patient loaded back on board, redo the pre-flight check, bla-bla. In other words, you don't get one of those things off the ground in 8 minutes from the call; it's more like 20.
  
Call me a ground rig, I'll take my chances - and possibly save some over-adrenalized flight crew from disaster.

DB
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