[A physician-staffed heart ambulance in a rural district. A 1-year trial]

A trial period of one year in which the ambulance service for patients with acute cardiac disease was improved is described. This trial took pace in the County of Vestsjaelland in a mixed urban and rural district with five general practices and with more than fifteen kilometres (9.4 miles) to the county hospital. Two ambulance stations were equipped with defibrillators and the staff were trained in their use. The recommendations made by a subcommittee appointed by the Danish Board of Health were thus fulfilled, but, in addition, the general practitioners/doctors-on-duty were connected with the arrangement. They were equipped with radios by which they could communicate with the ambulance stations. If the leader of the ambulance station considered, on the basis of the alarm, that a patient with acute cardiac disease was involved, the doctor-on-duty in the district concerned was contact so that he could come and participate in the treatment unless prevented by other work. An attempt was made to assess the effect of an arrangement such as this on survival of patients, the extent to which medical assistance can be obtained and the extent of the actual medical assistance. During the trial period, 158 turn-outs occurred to the approximately 30,000 population in the district concerned. The total number of emergency ambulance turn-outs was 1,200, 41 of these were patients with clinical cardiac arrest and 56 to patients with other forms of acute cardiac disease. Sixty-one patients were found to have conditions other than cardiac diseases. It proved possible to provide medical assistance in 79% of the cases.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)