N.W.T. launches new medevac co-ordination system for communities

When health care workers in communities outside Yellowknife have an emergency situation on their hands, now they only need to dial one number to reach the medical support and air ambulance dispatch that their patient needs.

Med Response is a new program, based out of Stanton Territorial Hospital, that plugs community health care workers into both medical support and air ambulance triage over the phone.

Arranging ambulance transport, talking to one physician and that physician needs to call Alberta, and that person needs to call another person, says Stanton CEO Brenda Fitzgerald, explaining the process prior to Med Response. It reduces the amount of time that clinicians are spending calling each other.

Supporters say Med Response has already proven useful in saving time and reducing confusion.

The centre is staffed by emergency medical co-ordinators (registered nurses) working alongside air ambulance dispatchers, and is supervised by a nurse practitioner. Operators are on duty 24 hours a day.

When a community health-care worker calls in, the co-ordinator keeps them on the line while bringing in necessary medical experts to discuss the case and plan a course of action. Flight preparations are simultaneously made by the dispatcher. Like an old-fashioned party-line, or conference call, everyone stays on the phone at the same time.

The program has been live for three months, and Fitzgerald says its proven its worth by allowing community clinicians to focus on the patient.

The care is now being co-ordinated by the emergency medical co-ordinator and the dispatcher in real time and theyre continuing to connect and provide support as well to the person on the other end of the phone, who is the person with the patient. she says.

So its a higher level of support.

Fitzgerald adds that Med Response staff will know who is on call at any time and will be able to more easily reach appropriate medical expertise.

"That connection could be a nurse practitioner, it could be one of our emergency practitioners at Stanton, it could be a specialist based in Yellowknife, or it could be a specialist in Alberta," she says.

The program costs about a million dollars to run. Its overseen by Stanton hospital's medical director, Dr. Anna Reid.

Since Med Response launched in November there have been 700 calls to the service.

About 400 of those calls resulted in a medevac plane being dispatched; the rest were handled by medical consultation given over the phone.

The slogan is one call connects all, says Fitzgerald. And thats a really, really powerful improvement in service delivery.