Pre-Hospital Critical Care at Major Incidents

The author emphasizes the importance of effective prehospital care and triage to patients’ survival after a mass casualty incident, including providing rapid casualty assessment and setting up temporary infrastructure to treat and transport patients to a hospital. The author notes that developed emergency medical systems can adapt to treat many patients and that pre-hospital care integrated into the emergency response is important. Note that this reflects European strategies to ‘stay and play’ and bring additional resources to the scene as opposed to American emphasis on rapid transport to hospitals.