10 Apr 2013

Residents of Mahalapye and surrounding villages have been urged to utilise emergency medical services (EMS) at the district hospital.

Mahalapye hospital public relations officer, Ms Pauline Bontle said in an interview that although the EMS was introduced in December 2012, the services had not been fully utilised by residents.

She pointed out that the services were introduced to assist the community by responding to emergencies and providing the relevant care according to their urgent needs. Ms Bontle explained that emergencies such as heart attacks, victims of road accidents and fire needed extra care, therefore patients had to be handled properly before reaching the hospital.

She said the purpose of EMS was to also cater for outside hospital emergencies and accidents in order to provide on scene care while the patient is on transit to hospital. Ms Bontle said they had realised that accidents and emergencies were the second largest epidemic after HIV/AIDS hence the Ministry of Health responded through EMS to help curb deaths.

She highlighted that EMS personnel had been trained to promptly attend to road accidents that usually occurred along the A1 road. Furthermore, Ms Bontle urged the public to use the emergency toll free 997 to report all kind of emergencies and accidents around the Mahalapye Sub-district, saying the number was accessed through all local mobile networks.

She said the hospital had trained personnel who attended to the emergency number 24/7 in order to respond quickly to emergencies and accidents.

Meanwhile, Ms Bontle lashed at those who played hoax at the emergency line, saying they should refrain from misuse of the number. ENDS