On Sunday, a one-month-old baby boy with congenital heart disease was transported from Kolhapur to Mumbai’s Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani Hospital by six ambulances that covered the 370 km distance in phases. The baby is now admitted to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit and awaiting surgery. Last month, a pregnant woman was shifted from Mumbai, over 420 km, to her maternal home in Jalna, where she had registered for childbirth. Seven ambulances relayed the patient, one after another, to safely transport the woman who was in her eighth month of pregnancy.
The ‘108’ ambulance service operated by the Maharashtra Emergency Medical Services (MEMS) — a project of the Government of Maharashtra that is being implemented and operated by BVG India Ltd. — has helped transport patients over long distances during the lockdown by using multiple vehicles without compromising on the availability of ambulances to cater to emergencies by sending them back after they have covered shorter distances.
Since the lockdown began in March, 150 patients have been transported by roping in multiple ambulances from the local fleet. “A majority of these patients were newborn babies who required emergency treatment in advanced centres,” said Dnyaneshwar Shelke, chief operating officer, MEMS. “There were a lot of pregnancy related emergencies as well,” Dr. Shelke added.
MEMS has a fleet of 937 ambulances in the State including 93 in Mumbai, 84 in Pune and 42 in Nagpur. Dr Shelke said that due to the ongoing COVID-19 emergency, pulling out even one ambulance from the local fleet becomes difficult. “Through a well-coordinated relay, ambulances pick up the patients from one point to another where the next ambulance is ready for pick up. The coordination is done from the main control as well as the ambulance drivers,” he said, adding that multiple ambulances were roped in only for patients who did not require any life support.
Trauma to COVID care
The ‘108’ service is aimed at responding within the ‘golden hour’ when accident and disaster victims needing trauma care are more likely to survive if they reach the emergency room of a hospital that can provide the specialised care. But since the COVID-19 outbreak, almost 71,953 patients who used the service were either suspected or confirmed cases of the infection. Of these, 16,968 patients were from Mumbai.
“These transfers involved home to COVID Care Centres or from COVID Care Centres to hospitals or the other way,” said Dr. Shelke adding that in March, April and May, almost 45% of the total 1.8 lakh transfers were COVID-19 related. MEMS has dedicated 318 ambulances for COVID-19 related transfers.
The availability of ambulances has been one of the major challenges during the pandemic as hundreds of private ambulances stopped operating due to fear of infection. The State’s ‘108’ fleet has had 46 doctors and drivers testing positive, with one of them even succumbing to the infection.