Service
TraumaLink uses an emergency hotline number and 24-hour call center with local first responders who are trained in basic trauma first aid, given essential medical supplies, and dispatched to crash scenes through mobile phone text message notifications. Volunteers are taught in groups of no more than 15 students on crash scene management, basic trauma first aid, and mass casualty triage with an emphasis on hands-on training from a Bangladeshi physician. The training curriculum focuses on simple lifesaving skills that people with any level of education and no prior medical background can learn and perform.
Our call center, available through a dedicated emergency hotline number, uses a custom-designed graphic user interface (GUI) to rapidly connect injured victims with help. Operators receiving a call first collect information on where the crash occurred and how many patients have been injured. As soon as this information is entered into the GUI, the software automatically dispatches the closest volunteers through text messages to their mobile phones.
Operators notify police and fire services as needed and volunteers collect first aid kits en route to the crash scene. When patients are ready for transport, operators provide guidance on the nearest hospital capable of treating their injuries. Victims arrive there quickly using local transportation networks that include fire services, police, vehicles for hire, and bystanders.
Establishing a dense network of local volunteers has also helped us to collect detailed data on crashes that is being used to guide road safety improvements, and is being published in academic research papers to broaden the scope of knowledge about road safety and community-based prehospital care in developing nations.
Improving Data Collection to Improve Road Safety
High-quality data on RTIs are often unavailable in LMICs. The lack of reliable information to drive the creation and ongoing funding of effective countermeasures helps to perpetuate and exacerbate dangerous road conditions. Establishing a dense network of local volunteers helped us address the lack of comprehensive data on crashes and injuries by combining a sensitive surveillance system with a directed effort to collect and record all details within the first few hours after the completion of a crash response.
This information has been used by local policy makers for guiding road safety improvements, and is also being published in academic research to broaden the scope of knowledge around proving prehospital care in developing nations.
Volunteer First Aid Training
We have developed a model in which local community members are recruited and trained to act as layperson volunteer first responders treating traffic injury victims at the crash scene, free of charge. Volunteers are trained in crash scene management, basic trauma first aid, and mass casualty triage and provided with essential medical supplies kept in easily accessible locations.
We designed the training curriculum to teach simple lifesaving skills that people with any level of education and no prior medical background can learn and perform. All of our training is conducted in small groups of no more than 15 students. There is an emphasis on hands-on training, under the direct supervision of a physician trainer, so that students can remember and perform these skills even in a time of crisis.
