Certainly the med-evac point is valid, but I bet you could come up with a basic traffic monitoring system using an off the shelf Drone today for a fraction of the cost of a helicopter, fuel, and pilot.
Read his statement as “medical services” and “medical evac”.
Of course a helicopter can do a generic evacuation. That just means picking up a passenger..
An absolutely outrageous misuse of resources for a patient who did not need air evac. These flights aren’t cheap and the patient and family are billed. This isn’t one of those ignore and it will go away kind of medical bills either - it will be a charge from the city for $10,000+ and will absolutely go to collections.
There isn’t a trained air medic on board nor is there appropriate medical equipment to handle a patient who needs emergency life saving care and rapid delivery to a trauma 1 hospital. In other words, a patient who qualifies for emergency air evacuation.
Strapping a stable and visibly uninjured patient to a gurney and flying to the hospital isn’t helpful, it’s idiotic. We already have enough bullshit trauma 1 activations. There’s no need for more, much less ones delivered by bored traffic pilots.
What is a trauma 1 activation? I get what it's meant to sound like, but that's not a phrase I've heard in 12 years as a paramedic (but that will no doubt vary around the country). In this area it's Code 3 (i.e. critical) Trauma, and has nothing to do with the Trauma designator of the target hospital.
As for bullshit activations, in most places, this is done by a tool often signed off by the state under medical direction: https://doh.wa.gov/sites/default/files/legacy/Documents/Pubs...
One of the reasons to do this is to try to remove "emotional" considerations, and stick to objective criteria. Another similar thing is for Airlift pilots, where they are deliberately not given patient information when they are determining whether to fly. They are told pick up point and destination only. This is to avoid, "We really shouldn't have flown, but it was a toddler with significant burns, so we took a chance on it" type situations.
Thankfully, the police officers received a call for help and responded to it. It's not too hard to imagine what would happen if a person had internal trauma and an unskilled observer said "nah, you look fine." We quite literally could have riots over a cop letting a person die like that.
An untrained person unprofessionally assessing a patient in the field and then asking for an air evacuation should not happen. At bare minimum the first responder should be trained in performing a trauma survey and checking vital signs. However, there must be situations in which evacuations such as this example are performed inappropriately. Once an evacuation is requested it’s dutifully performed, inappropriate or not.
The example in the article is one such case. A non-medical helicopter without proper equipment for life threatening injuries was used. And as you said, if this person had internal injuries and destabilized during flight - what would they have done? Could they place an IV or do intraosseus access, give a fluid bolus, provide Epinephrine/vasopressors, or protect airway and intubate? Can they perform CPR?
This evacuation was purely a ride and not properly staffed or equipped for a patient with life threatening injuries or for a patient at risk of destabilizing. The pilot shouldn’t have taken the patient nor should the air evac been requested.
> Any field provider may request air transport via [our 911 dispatch]. An ALS (Advanced Life Support/paramedic) upgrade is required. Transport necessity and destination shall be determined by the ALS provider in consultation with the medical control physician on duty.
"if this person had internal injuries and destabilized during flight"
Well, in that case, bluntly, the choice of transport probably isn't the biggest concern. Secondarily, our protocols also discuss transportation by ground to a lower tier facility that's close to provide some stabilization before air transport to an appropriate facility.
Also destabilization during air medivac is not uncommon, choice of transport does therefore matter. The flight nurse is very capable and able to perform immediate life saving procedures during flight. Medivac flights aren’t just helicopter rides, there’s active treatment going on. And in the case of a patient who is stable but could deteriorate there is the potential for immediate response.
Over on the west coast, less so (I work as a ground paramedic in the PNW).
That being said, local law enforcement agencies absolutely use drones. Perhaps not for traffic enforcement, but for general surveillance, especially during events with large crowds.