"Transporting Emergency Patients from Other Regions to Hospitals"... Government Establishes 'Gwangyeok Emergency Medical Situation Room'

Ambulance [Image source=Yonhap News]

As emergency patients have died while drifting in ambulances, the government is pushing for a plan to support transferring patients to hospitals in neighboring cities and provinces.

On the 30th, the Ministry of Health and Welfare held the 2nd meeting of the Central Emergency Medical Policy Promotion Team and decided to promote the establishment of a "Metropolitan Emergency Medical Situation Room" to transfer and refer emergency patients beyond administrative boundaries to hospitals in adjacent areas. When a male emergency patient in his 70s occurred in Yongin, Gyeonggi Province on May 30, paramedics transferred him to Uijeongbu Hospital in northern Gyeonggi instead of a closer hospital in Seoul due to the emergency administrative system, causing delays in patient treatment. The system aims to allow transfers to the nearest hospital regardless of administrative districts to protect the emergency patient's "golden time."

At the meeting, improvement plans for the "119 Ambulance Smart System," which allows 119 paramedics to uniformly select hospitals, provide patient information to emergency rooms, and confirm emergency room availability, were also discussed. The government plans to start a pilot operation in October.

Measures to protect emergency medical workers from legal disputes that may arise due to strengthened obligations to accept emergency patients were also reviewed.

Park Hyang, Director of Public Health Policy at the Ministry of Health and Welfare, stated, "The Metropolitan Emergency Medical Situation Room is a short-term measure prepared for severely ill emergency patients who have been unaccepted for a long time at this point." He added, "We will promptly finalize detailed installation and operation plans and swiftly strengthen the capabilities of the 119 Ambulance Situation Management Center."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.