Mainz. The rural Rhineland-Palatinate region wants to be the first federal state to introduce a tele-emergency doctor nationwide. Emergency paramedics can then call emergency doctors during their rescue missions and implement their instructions. “We want to protect the valuable resource of emergency doctors,” said the state’s Interior Minister Michael Ebling in an interview with the German Press Agency.
Emergency physicians often spend an incredible amount of time traveling all over the country. With the added service of tele-emergency, they could be called in quickly and tell paramedics what to examine, administer or do. “The emergency physician can sit anywhere, there just needs to be enough for the entire area,” Ebling said.
“In individual cases, the tele-emergency doctors can also bring in other specialists, such as a pulmonologist,” the Interior Minister added. The next step towards a comprehensive offer is expected to take place in the second half of 2024. Experiences with the pilot project since 2023 at the BG Accident Clinic in Ludwigshafen have been consistently positive. Trier is expected to follow first. At the same time, discussions were already underway with the University Medical Center Mainz, the Bundeswehr Central Hospital in Koblenz and the West Palatinate Clinic in Kaiserslautern.
“The teleemergency doctor should complement this,” said Ebling about a year ago at the start of the pilot project in Ludwigshafen. Experiences from other federal states have shown that the locations of emergency doctors could be made easier in this way – and emergency doctors could then be wherever it was most urgent. (dpa)