Emergencies are inevitable and acute life-threatening conditions may happen to anyone, anywhere. Pre-hospital care is an essential part of emergency response which focuses on caring for seriously ill or injured patients before they reach a hospital, and during emergency transfer to hospital or between hospitals. This will serve as the initial point-of-contact by the first responders or emergency medical technicians. At this level of intervention, even a basic assessment of the patient is crucial and will affect the outcomes of the patient. A lot of factors play a role in pre-hospital care such as a functional protocol, trained medical responders, fully-equipped transport vehicles, and many more. All of these factors matter as time is very essential in responding to life-threatening situations.
But in the iWitness documentary, Ambulansyang de-paa, all of the barriers not just in pre-hospital care, but also in our health system, were revealed. To this day, geographically isolated areas lack access to basic health care. It remains a challenge for them to get treatment for preventable diseases. Health centers are located far from them and residents had to make a hammock to transport non-ambulatory patients from the mountains down to the health center in order to get treatment. Burn patients do not get proper treatment and suffer the consequences. Just imagine if a functioning pre-hospital care is in place in these areas, we could prevent a lot of these cases from occurring or progressing.