The Golden Hour,
A Question of Life or Death

A little girl suffers a major head injury in a car crash. She is 75 km from your hospital as the crow flies. Much more by winding country roads. Statistically, if she is admitted to paediatric neurosurgery within 60 minutes she can be saved. This is the “Golden Hour”. Beyond this time, she has a 30%chance of dying. And an even greater chance of being permanently disabled.

Send an emergency unit by road? At that distance it will takemore than an hour just to get to the scene of the accident,much less back to the hospital. Her only hope is a Helicopter Emergency Medical Service (HEMS). Because only a helicopter can fly in a straight line to the accident site at 250 km/h, reaching the injured child in just 18 minutes. There, paramedics or a doctormay take theminimumof time to stabilise her condition. Eighteen minutes more and she will be safely in surgery. with transport side effects on wounded brain reduced to the minimum. Time to spare: an average emergency mission by road is 40 minutes each way. The same mission for a helicopter is around 17 minutes each way.

Every year 2% of the population of a developed country will need emergency transportation to a hospital. Many of these millions of victims live beyond the “Golden Hour” zone for ground emergency vehicles. But most can be reached and saved by helicopter.

Hospitals and HEMS operators around the world increased their purchases of helicopters by almost 40% between 2001 and 2005. But they increased their purchases of Eurocopter emergency medical aircraft by 100%.

Only a Helicopter Emergency Medical Service: