Pre-hospital emergency medical services in developing countries: a case study about EMS response time in Yazd, Iran

ABSTRACT

Pre-hospital emergency medical services, a subsystem of Emergency Medical Services [EMS], provides early care to critically ill and injured patients in the field. Time is an important factor in pre-hospital care and the length of time it takes to reach care, has a significant impact on patient outcome. This study aims to calculate the response time in EMS stations of Yazd, Iran. During 2008-2009, 11961 run report forms from all 7 EMS stations in Yazd that had been submitted to central station were surveyed. By using Excell statistical software and descriptive statistics [percent, cumulative distribution and standard deviation], we calculated fractile response times for Yazd EMS. 81.15 percent of response times were within 8 minutes as a referenced standard for EMS. The majority of call services in Yazd EMS have been responded in a suitable time interval comparing with reference standards and country's approved EMS response time goal, but there are still rooms for improvement