International symposium on emergency medicine

Figure 2 (right): 
What education should EMS providers have about procedures with different types of patients?
An open question at the end of the survey gave participants the possibility to leave a comment or
an opinion. Some mentioned the problem of not being informed about the patient diagnosis before
the transport (n=3); others pointed out that there is no education for that specific field and expressed
the view that it should be organized (n=5). 
Table 1a: Personal estimation
Table 1b: Unit estimation
Less than 5 times per year:
5
5 – 10 times per year:
7 
11 – 15 times per year:
2 
16 – 20 times per year:
2 
More than 20 times per year:
5 
Less than 5 times per year:
2 
5 – 10 times per year:
7 
11 – 15 times per year:
2 
16 – 20 times per year:
0 
More than 20 times per year:
10
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in the law and some other general details about how and when the different categories of the diseases
are to be notified. An interesting part of the regulation is the section about other special measures for
the control of communicable disease. In one of the five articles an exact instruction is given about how
to isolate the patient, and in another that all patients with an infective form of TBC must be treated.
So the questions about the ambulance transport still remain. Do we need special protocols to
organize and implement the transport of contagious patients? Are such protocols in use anywhere? Do
EMS employers have enough knowledge about this topic? Do we need special education to be
included in regular continuing education for EMS providers? 
This paper proposes that guidelines for the ambulance transport of the infectious patient are
needed and that if they do not already exist, they should be developed locally.