DRF Luftrettung is investing in the protection of patients and its crews to ensure that, in these times of the coronavirus, people in medical emergencies can still be rescued as fast as possible. The first step will be made next week, when two helicopter emergency medical services (HEMS) bases will be equipped with isolation stretchers known as “EpiShuttles.”
A further eight HEMS bases will soon follow suit. These stretchers will not only help crews save valuable time, but will also afford them optimum protection. The newly equipped HEMS bases will be ready for action after each operation more quickly, as the very time-consuming disinfection of helicopters after missions with corona-infected patients will no longer be necessary.
More and more people need fast access to intensive-care beds with ventilators but are at present transported predominantly by road, which costs time and can put lives at risk. Unfortunately, this need is likely to increase strongly in the coming weeks.
“The innovative ‘EpiShuttles’ enable patients to be transported as if in an intensive care unit. The person lies under a transparent cover and can be connected to an intensive respiratory device via air-tight access points while being monitored and treated at the same time. In this way, we can fly well-monitored patients quickly and safely to hospitals with free ventilator-equipped intensive-care beds, while our crews are protected from infection even better than before and can continue their life-saving operations,” explained the medical director of DRF Luftrettung, Dr. Jörg Braun.
An “EpiShuttle” currently costs about $US44,400.
“DRF Luftrettung has decided to make this important investment in the lives and safety of patients and crews and would highly welcome any support from donors and sponsors for this urgent measure. In these times, in which every minute counts all the more, we want to do everything in our power to be there for people in need,” said Dr. Krystian Pracz, chairman of the executive board at DRF Luftrettung, about this investment.
