Ambulance Safety

BU

Ambulance Safety

The Need for Improvement

Tami Cusick

Loma Linda University

EMMC 471

From sunrise to sunset, emergency medical personnel are there to rescue the people that need it without hesitation. But these same people are putting themselves in danger while coming to rescue the endangered. The thought of safety is typically the furthest thing on their mind as they rush through traffic, busy streets and weather affected roads. The public may think that they are driving the one of the safest vehicles made; after all they are in an ambulance. But, the reality is that there are many ways that the very ambulance they are driving or riding in, is actually the very thing that can kill them.

The occupational fatality rate for EMS professionals exceeds that of the general population (Maguire, Hunting, Smith, & Levick, 2002). Emergency medical personnel are exposed to a variety of hazards but, in an occupation where the ambulance is their office, it should be the safest environment for all occupants. There professionals are is a business that suggests safety and all aspects of the industry should be required to uphold the highest safety standards possible. Seventy –four percent of EMS workers are killed due to transportation related causes and ambulance crashes are an alarming twenty-seven to thirty-three percent more fatal that those of fire and police vehicles (Eliot, 2009). There is also approximately one EMS employee being killed about every two weeks (Dean, 2010).

This is a dangerous job. According to EMSnetwork.org there were 6,500 ambulance crashes between May 1, 2007 and April 30, 2009. Of these 6,500 crashes 358 resulted in injuries to the EMS personnel, other vehicle occupants, patients being transported and pedestrians. There is no detailed data of the seating positions of any of the occupants. 79 crashes resulted in fatalities in which 99 people were killed. When we compare these statistics to those of...