Abstract:
The aim of this article was to analyze the timeliness of emergency medical care (time transpired between the injury and the first contact with the Emergency Medical System) and its assocation with different negative health outcome in traffic accident victims treated at two Mexican hospitals, one in Guadalajara, Jalisco, and the other in León, Guanajuato, based on data from the Motor Vehicle Accident Epidemiological Surveillance System of the Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Global Road Safety Program. Information was obtained on all patients treated for motor vehicle injuries in referral hospitals from May 2012 to November 2014. Multinomial logistic regression was used to model the health outcomes, categorized as short stay, prolonged hospitalization, disability, and death, compared to timeliness of care, adjusted by different target variables. A total of 2,575 patients were analyzed. Time from injury to care was 103.74 minutes (± 231.36) in León and 75.37 minutes (± 156.87) in Guadalajara; it was 38.02 and 36.23 minutes, respectively, in patients that received prehospital medical care. Timely care was associated with less prolonged hospital stay, but not with lower incidence of disability or death. Receiving prehospital medical care was associated statistically with negative health consequences. Timely care was associated with lower probability of prolonged hospitalization. Strategies are needed to evaluate and in turn improve the technical quality of prehospital medical care, including timeliness of care and adequate regulation.
Keywords:
Traffic Accidents; Prehospitalar Care; Time-to-treatment; Emergency Medical Services
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