The Golden Hour

December 16, 2008 - 11:32 PM by DavidS

If there’s one thing Israeli medics are good at, it’s first aid. As a result of battlefield experience over 60 years of war, chovshim, as they are called in the IDF, have learned how to treat serious injuries with few supplies under heavily pressure.

The lessons learned on the battlefield prove invaluable for major civilian emergencies as well, such as the tragic bus crash outside Eilat. Sixty Russian tourists on a junket to Eilat plunged off the side of a narrow, twisty road to a ravine nearly 200 feet deep. Twenty four people died, and the rest were all in serious condition, as of Tuesday night. While many were killed on the spot, several died of the injuries they sustained later on,

What if the injured had gotten treatment sooner? Could they have been saved? Maybe, say doctors who advocate the Golden Hour theory that even severely injured people have a higher chance of surviving if they get substantial, emergency room style treatment within the first hour after they’re injured. The problem is getting them to the treatment site especially under difficult field conditions, such as when a bus is stuck at the bottom of a ravine, with no path or road to the top, and no place for a helicopter to land. Not to mention that moving the injured often makes things worse, exacerbating the problem and making treatment at the facility more complicated.

There is a solution on the horizon, though. As it happens, I spoke to Dr. Eran Shenkar today, a battlefield medical expert who has helped develop a new concept vehicle for remote medical care, called the MedUAV. Interviewing Dr. Shenkar and others at the Fisher Institute in Herzliya in preparation for an article for 21C (look for it soon!), I had no idea how relevant the conversation would be just a few hours later.

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The MedUAV, says Dr. Shenkar, can essentially bring the emergency room to the field. Developed for the battlefield, it’s also ideal for civilian emergencies in difficult to reach circumstances. As a remote UAV, it’s smaller, cheaper, and more compact than a helicopter meaning it can go places a helicopter can’t, and, in times of war, there’s nobody to shoot down. The MedUAV can land or take off vertically, meaning it’s ideal for use in, say, a narrow ravine where there’s no place for a helicopter to land. The MedUAV can carry sophisticated equipment equipped with Wi-fi sensors, allowing a field medic to hook up a patient and allow a doctor to provide remote treatment, by giving instructions to the medic. And, after it delivers its supplies, the MedUAV can transport patients back to the medical tent, where they can be transported to hospitals by helicopter.

It’s a great solution to the golden hour problem and when it’s ready for field use, chances are good that tragedies like today’s bus crash will end up being a bit less tragic, with perhaps many more of the injured being restored to good health more quickly.

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