Annals of Disaster Medicine |
ISSN:1684-193X |
Updated
Aug 18 , 2005 |
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Contents:
Volume 4, Number 1; July, 2005 |
Improving Pre-hospital Recording by Ambulance Cooperation under Administrative Regulations |
Tzong-Luen Wang, MD, PhD; Hang Chang, MD, PhD |
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Abstract -- To investigate the impact of administrative regulations on improving the completeness and quality of
pre-hospital recordings (PCRs), we compared the PCRs from ambulance agencies during two
different periods, that is, from July 2004 to December 2004 (the first stage that administrative
regulations has not yet been implemented) and from January 2005 to June 2005 (the second stage
that administrative regulations has been implemented). Overall completeness and item-wise review
were performed for each PCRs from inter-hospital transfer by ambulance agencies. There were
185 patients (Group A) who were transferred from this institute to other hospitals during the first
stage 4 and 70 patients (Group B) transferred to other hospitals during the second stage. Sixty-eight
percent (126/185) of PCRs from Group A were not fulfilled at all, and 30% (57/185) of these
PCRs were not recorded completely. In contrast, 17% (12/70) and 21% (15/70) of the PCRs from
Group B were lacking and incompletely recorded, respectively
(P<0.01 between the two groups). Item-wise review of the available PCRs revealed that improvement were found in patient assessment findings (58/58 or 100% in Group B vs. 29/59 or 49%, P<0.01), care rendered before arrival to receiving hospitals (50/58 or 86% in Group B vs. 25/59 or 42%, P<0.05), clinical observations including responses to interventions (42/58 or 72% in Group B vs. 18/59 or 31%, P<0.05), and medical decision making (41/58 or 71% in Group B vs. 18/59 or 31%, P<0.05). In conclusion, this study demonstrated that implementation of administrative regulation and assurance of health policies was proven to improve such deficiencies. It is believed to be an essential step in disaster preparation.
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Key words--- Pre-hospital Records; Ambulance; Emergent Medical Service; Disaster
Preparedness |
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