What clinical crew competencies and qualifications are required for helicopter emergency medical services? A review of the literature.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Patients served by Helicopter Emergency Medical Services (HEMS) tend to be acutely injured or unwell and in need of stabilisation followed by rapid and safe transport. It is therefore hypothesised that a particular clinical crew composition is required to provide appropriate HEMS patient care. A literature review was performed to test this hypothesis.

Methods

MEDLINE, EMBASE, Web of Science and the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews were systematically searched from 1 January 2009 to 30 August 2019 to identify peer-reviewed articles of relevance. All HEMS studies that mentioned 'staffing', 'configuration', 'competencies' or 'qualifications' in the title or abstract were selected for full-text review.

Results

Four hundred one studies were identified. Th

SUBMITTER: Masterson S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7164232 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature