The role of emergency medical services in primary injury prevention. Consensus workshop. Arlington, Virginia, August 25-26, 1995.
Injury is a leading cause of death and disability. Preventing injuries from ever occurring is primary injury prevention (PIP). The objective of this statement is to present the consensus of a 16-member panel of leaders from the out-of-hospital emergency medical services (EMS) community on essential and desirable EMS PIP activities. Essential PIP activities for leaders and decision makers of every EMS system include: protecting individual EMS providers from injury; providing education to EMS providers in PIP fundamentals; supporting and promoting the collection and utilization of injury data; obtaining support for PIP activities; networking with other injury prevention organizations; empowering individual EMS providers to conduct PIP activities; interacting with the media to promote injury prevention; and participating in community injury prevention interventions. Essential PIP knowledge areas for EMS providers include: PIP principles; personal injury prevention and role modeling; safe emergency vehicle operation; injury risk identification; documentation of injury data; and one-on-one safety education.
Garrison
H G
HG
Department of Emergency Medicine, East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina, USA. hgarriso@pcmh.com
Foltin
G L
GL
Becker
L R
LR
Chew
J L
JL
Johnson
M
M
Madsen
G M
GM
Miller
D R
DR
Ozmar
B H
BH
D000056:Accident Prevention; D000063:Accidents, Traffic / Q000517:prevention & control; D002983:Clinical Competence; D004632:Emergency Medical Services; D006266:Health Education; D006293:Health Promotion; D006801:Humans; D011322:Primary Prevention; D014947:Wounds and Injuries / Q000517:prevention & control*