Cunningham Charmaine, Rosenberg Matthew, Kahle Jurgen
Department of Surgery, Division of Emergency Medicine, University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa.
Afr J Emerg Med. 2022 Sep;12(3):236-241. doi: 10.1016/j.afjem.2022.04.003. Epub 2022 Jun 10.
Volunteering yields valuable benefits to communities, yet globally there is limited published data regarding emergency medical volunteering in communities. Hout Bay Volunteer Emergency Medical Service is thought to be the oldest volunteer ambulance service in Cape Town. The objective of this paper is to quantify the contribution of the community service to the Western Cape Government Health: Emergency Medical Service. This paper describes the inputs, key stakeholder relationships, and the impact of COVID-19 on volunteer input and community needs.
Electronic Computer-Aided Dispatch records were used for analysis. Data extracted included detailed information about all recorded incidents between 1 January 2015 to 31 December 2020. Data were analysed in Google Sheets using Pivot Tables and summary statistics.
Between 2015 and 2020 HBVEMS responded to approximately 12% of all call-outs in the Hout Bay area, which equates to 2187.16 h of operational time spent on calls. This excludes standby time, i.e., time spent waiting to be dispatched. There was an expected noticeable difference between response times for ambulances based within Hout Bay, and those from outside Hout Bay. Despite a decline in average call-out rate during the 2020 Level 5 lockdown, the volunteers were able to do more shifts and thus more calls within the community. Call-outs during 2020 were visualised as a ratio of trauma to medical calls. In this period there were noticeably fewer trauma calls.
There is a growing need for emergency medical care, and volunteer ambulance services can have a meaningful impact on the continent. The findings support the benefit of developing community-based ambulance services, especially in areas that are remote due to distance or topography. The model can be expanded to other communities across the continent. A key factor for success is actively managing stakeholder relationships which include community-based relationships as well as governmental or formal emergency medical services relationships.
志愿服务为社区带来了宝贵的益处，但在全球范围内，关于社区紧急医疗志愿服务的已发表数据有限。豪特湾志愿紧急医疗服务被认为是开普敦最古老的志愿救护服务。本文的目的是量化该社区服务对西开普省政府卫生部门紧急医疗服务的贡献。本文描述了投入、关键利益相关者关系以及新冠疫情对志愿者投入和社区需求的影响。
使用电子计算机辅助调度记录进行分析。提取的数据包括2015年1月1日至2020年12月31日期间所有记录事件的详细信息。在谷歌表格中使用数据透视表和汇总统计对数据进行分析。
2015年至2020年期间，豪特湾志愿紧急医疗服务响应了豪特湾地区约12%的出诊呼叫，这相当于在出诊呼叫上花费了2187.16小时的运营时间。这不包括待命时间，即等待调度的时间。豪特湾内的救护车与豪特湾外的救护车在响应时间上存在预期的显著差异。尽管在2020年5级封锁期间平均出诊率有所下降，但志愿者能够进行更多轮班，从而在社区内处理更多呼叫。2020年的出诊呼叫以创伤呼叫与医疗呼叫的比例进行可视化展示。在此期间，创伤呼叫明显减少。
对紧急医疗护理的需求日益增长，志愿救护服务可以对该大陆产生有意义的影响。研究结果支持发展基于社区的救护服务的益处，特别是在因距离或地形偏远的地区。该模式可扩展到该大陆的其他社区。成功的一个关键因素是积极管理利益相关者关系，其中包括基于社区的关系以及政府或正式紧急医疗服务关系。
