Medical Transportation in Natural Disasters

Posted on October 01, 2018

During times of natural disasters; rescue missions (especially where access by road is a problem) are best supported by the speed and reliability offered by air medical transport. Even with the introduction of advanced warning tools, preparations to handle natural disasters have never been sufficient. It is because people are often too naive to accept that natural disasters can happen to them, whereby they choose not to take precautionary measures. It is therefore important to understand that lack of basic preparation can lead to serious injuries or even death in some cases. When looking for the best medical flight for your medical emergency, ensure that the provider has the following procedures in place:

Evacuating people from disaster areas, especially from remote locations that are difficult to access are missions that require specialist training. The air medical transport team should be well skilled and trained for missions of this calibre.There should be a specialist to specify the landing & holding areas and landing & takeoff paths. Safety zones along with potential risks such as power lines, pylons, treas and cables need to be identified. Also, there is a need to consider the risk of impending mishaps such as avalanches and landslides to ensure safe air medical transport.

Operations centre should remain in charge of the mission carried out, from the beginning till the end. Facilitating the crew where needed and take all the decisions. There should be coordinated helicopter landings and take-offs.

Best medical flight providers have an array of different planes and helicopters to carry out unique missions. Helicopters have the ability to cope with weather conditions and tricky landings. While these are best to carry out tasks of this nature, there is limited capacity for how many people or how much medical equipment can be carried. Keeping that in mind,paramedics, along with the pilot should be capable to share responsibility in order to bring some structure to the process. The landing of larger helicopters can only be facilitated if the area can endure downward deflection of the airflow during takeoff and landing created by the rotors.

The air medical transport team should be able to foresee the need to carry food, medical supplies and sheets if there is a possibility that the patient or their loved one may be in need of those. Best medical flights providers would ideally have accreditation from renowned bodies and a history of completing such missions successfully.