Emergency medical service is intended for treatment in emergencies.

Emergency medical service is part of the healthcare system. Emergency medical staff, or paramedics, assess the condition of patients with sudden illnesses or injuries, and provide urgent care and transport them to the emergency room for further examinations or treatment, if necessary. Paramedics examine and interview patients to assess their need for treatment.

In an emergency, paramedics start the patient’s treatment immediately. The treatment and monitoring of the patient’s condition continues during ambulance transport to an emergency room of the healthcare system.

Examples of emergencies include

  • lifelessness,
  • respiratory distress,
  • severe chest pain,
  • paralysis symptoms,
  • convulsions,
  • poisoning,
  • serious injuries, and
  • heavy bleeding.

The decision on ambulance transport is based on paramedics’ assessment of the need for treatment. If there is no health emergency, urgent care is not needed. Paramedics can instruct patients to monitor the development of their symptoms at home and, if necessary, go to an emergency room or contact another healthcare service, instead of granting them ambulance transport.

Examples of non-urgent situations include

  • minor injuries, such as contusions, sprains, fractures of the finger bones,
  • small wounds without signs of major bleeding,
  • headache,
  • fever,
  • self-treated mild poisoning, and
  • pains or ailments that have continued unchanged for days, the cause of which has already been established in healthcare.

All emergency rooms of the healthcare system assess the urgency of the need for treatment based on the patient’s health status, so whether you arrive there on your own or in an ambulance will not affect how quickly your treatment begins.

When an ambulance is on a non-urgent assignment, it is not able to receive alarms for emergencies, which may delay the start of a critically ill patient’s treatment.
By assessing the need for treatment based on examinations and interviews, and possibly deciding not to transport a non-urgent patient, emergency medical service can help reduce congestion in emergency rooms. This ensures quick access to treatment for those urgently in need of treatment.  
However, it is important to note that each emergency medical service situation is assessed individually by healthcare professionals.
 

Further treatment places:

Relatives can enquire about patients transported by Helsinki City Rescue Department’s ambulances by calling the following helplines:

  • Meilahti Tower Hospital emergency department, tel. +358 9 4711, Haartmaninkatu 4, Helsinki
  • Haartman Hospital emergency department, tel. +358 9 4711, Haartmaninkatu 4, Helsinki
  • Malmi Hospital emergency department, tel. +358 9 4711, Talvelantie 6, Helsinki
  • New Children’s Hospital emergency department, tel. +358 9 471 72783, Stenbäckinkatu 9, Helsinki