Pre-hospital care time intervals among victims of road traffic injuries in Iran. A cross-sectional study

Road traffic injuries (RTIs) are a major public health problem, requiring concerted
efforts for prevention and reducing its consequences. On-time arrival of the
Emergency Medical Service (EMS) at crash scene and victims transportation by
trained personnel may reduce the RTIs consequences. The first 60 minutes after injury
occurrence - called “golden hour”- is most effective in saving lives. The present study
was designed to estimate the average of various time intervals of pre-hospital care and
to examine association and difference of these time intervals between city and
interurban roads.
Method
A retrospective cross-sectional study was designed and various time intervals in
relation to pre-hospital care of RTIs identified in the ambulance dispatch centre in
Oroumiyeh, Iran from 20 March 2005 to 20 March 2007. All cases which resulted to
ambulance dispatches were reviewed and those that had complete time intervals were
analyzed in this study.
Results
After data set clean up, 2027 cases of RTIs victims were included and analysed in this
study. Of these, 61.5 % of subjects were injured in city areas. The mean response time
for city locations was 5.0 minutes compared with to 10.6 minutes for interurban roads
locations. The mean scene time in the interurban roads was slightly longer than city
(9.2 vs. 6.1 minutes, p < 0.001). Mean transport times from the scene to the hospital
were also significantly longer for interurban incidents (17.1 minutes vs. 6.3 minutes).
The mean of total pre-hospital time was 37.2(±17.2) minutes with a median of 32.0.
In overall, 72.5% of the response interval time was less than eight minutes.