ASPHYXIATING AMBULANCE

From Sampath’s Desk:

DELAY SUFFERED BY AMBULANCE ON WAY TO HOSPITAL 

 

An ear-splitting spooky sound-making ambulance taking a seriously ill patient or the injured in an accident to the hospital would cause jitters among onlookers, as it uncomfortably wades through other vehicles on the road and squirms and inches along towards its destination. Reactions of people would be varied – fear, panic, sympathy, empathy, invoking prayers for the speedy recovery of the patient inside, etc. The importance of the ‘golden hour’ or ‘golden time’ during which the ambulance rushes the patient on medical emergency to the hospital needs no over-emphasis. It is well established that the patients' chances of survival and recovery are the greatest if they are taken to the hospital within a time as short as possible and made to receive medical treatment immediately after the medical emergency.

 

Although the thumb rule is that a screaming ambulance can pass through even jumping the red-signal at a road junction and other restrictive rules of the road, in cities and towns, one could see the siren-blaring ambulance getting entrapped amid riotous traffic snarls. Notwithstanding obligations on the part of the other plying vehicles to give way and let the speedster go non-stop, given the chaos of road transport traffic in urban milieus, the ambulance gets asphyxiated giving anxious moments to the patient if he is conscious and the person(s) accompanying him/her. With each second ticking on, their hearts will start pounding faster with their anxiety escalating. For, every second is precious. It will only be unfortunate if the seriously ailing/injured patients requiring immediate hospitalization were to get held up in the ambulance in the thick of road traffic especially at peak hours keeping the accompaniers edgy. The road traffic sergeant can however manually change even an automatic signal, from red to green, to enable the vehicles lined up in the lane along with the ambulance to cross the signal junction. However, whether such a thing is happening as a routine is doubtful!

 

In big cities like Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Delhi and Mumbai among others, many ambulances rushing through to hospitals with awe-generating distress sound is a daily event. I had seen many such ambulances writhing in the thicket of vehicles around without being able to move. I have also had occasions to suffer the pangs of such emergency and quandary while transporting my seriously ill mother to a hospital in ambulance years back.

 

On occasions when I happened to see the moving ambulances or the ones stuck up in traffic-jams, all I could do was to pray for the speedy recovery of the person in distress. One knows not how many precious lives would have been lost, or their conditions would have worsened in the ambulance itself en route to the hospital, or subsequently due to the delay in admission of the patient in the hospital.

 

The role of the driver in manoeuvring the ambulance and that of the accompanying paramedical personnel is crucial, as in their hands lay the fate of the patient. They would heave a sigh only on the safe admission of the patient in the hospital. Their agility and deft handling of the situation make all the difference. Kudos to them! The accompaniers would also face heightened tension, angst, and emotional turbulence till the patient gets admitted to the hospital and medical treatment is started as immediately as possible.

  

Even with awareness of the problem being very high, a solution is still elusive for the free, uninterrupted, and speedy movement of an ambulance in urban centres. It is for the think tank to ponder over the issue and come up with solutions for quick and uninterrupted movement of ambulances. Experts opine that one way to reduce ambulance travel time and hold-ups would be to create and/or designate certain roads as “Ambulance Routes.” But one knows not whether it is possible or feasible in India?  

                                                         

 

R.SAMPATH