title: Ambulance response time to emergency departments.
abstract: The study was conducted to ascertain the time it takes an ambulance team to reach a patient and transport the patient to an emergency department after a 995 call. One hundred and sixty-two cases brought to two emergency departments (Singapore General Hospital and Tan Tock Seng Hospital) between 11 March 1992 and 16 March 1992 were studied. The information was obtained from ambulance officers of the Singapore Civil Defence Force. It took an average of 11.40 +/- 4.88 minutes for an ambulance team to reach a patient and 30.50 +/- 10.62 minutes for the patient to reach an emergency department after a 995 call. With the present level of staff in Singapore, basic life support care starts 11.40 minutes and advanced life support care 30.50 minutes after a 995 call. These times are unacceptable if it involves a cardiac arrest or a trauma patient. Factors which cause these long time intervals include traffic congestion, inadequate public education, location of patient (whether on ground level or highrise) and distance from the emergency departments.
authors.affiliation: Department of Emergency Medicine, Tan Tock Seng Hospital, Singapore.
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Seow
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Lim
mesh_terms: D000552:Ambulances; D004636:Emergency Service, Hospital / Q000458:organization & administration; D006801:Humans; D008020:Life Support Care / Q000379:methods; D012846:Singapore; D013647:Task Performance and Analysis; D013997:Time Factors; D014187:Transportation of Patients