As health personnel grapple with increased emergencies, a call is being made for there to be more simulations done to help ease the process.
Senior Registrar at the Accident and Emergency Department at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH), Dr Chernelle Gittens, said it was important that people were aware of the immense pressures incidents such as stabbings, shootings or car accidents place on the hospital.
“A lot of people don’t realise that with one accident victim, that takes practically the entire staff of the Emergency Department to try to resuscitate them and that puts increased pressure on the emergency services, both pre-hospital and within the Emergency Department,” she said.
She was speaking to the DAILY NATION yesterday at Accra Beach Hotel during the Caribbean Dental Convention.
Gittens used the example of the collision at Four Roads, St John, on Sunday, where Carson Atkins lost his life.
“We had a major accident and unfortunately somebody died. One of my patients said to me: ‘I was calling the ambulance, but I was told that all of the ambulances were in St John tending to one accidents’. So that person had to try to get to the hospital another way. Then when all of the accident victims come in they take precedence and that slows the system down,” she explained. (TG)
