Tuesday 29th January 2019 – 10.50am – Claire Brown.
A pedestrian is in a serious condition after a collision with a vehicle in Worcester this morning.
West Midlands Ambulance Service received several 999 calls to reports of a road traffic collision involving a pedestrian and a vehicle on the A449 between Claines Lane and Ombersley Park junctions at 5.55am this morning (Tuesday). Two ambulances and a MERIT trauma doctor attended the scene.
A West Midlands Ambulance Service spokeswoman said: “When ambulance staff arrived on scene they found a pedestrian, a man, who had sustained serious injuries following a collision with a vehicle.
“The team of ambulance staff worked quickly to administer advanced trauma care to the man before he was taken by ambulance on blue lights and sirens to Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham for further emergency care.”
ENDS
What the hell is a MERIT Doctor?
Hello Elizabeth…apologies for a bit of jargon.
MERIT stands for Major Emergency Response Intervention Team!
What does that mean? Essentially, MERIT team is a highly trained doctor, consultant level, usually in anaesthesia or emergency medicine, who works with a critical care paramedic. There is one team available 24/7 in the West Midlands – during the day they fly on the Midland Air AMbulance based at RAF Cosford, and at night they are on a response vehicle based just off junction 2 of the M5
The types of cases they go to include:
• Trauma – requiring, for example, advanced management of pain’ advanced airway management’ fracture manipulation specialist extrication including amputation (RTCs, stabbings, industrial injuries etc)
• They have access to a much wider range of drugs for use in a pre-hospital setting
• Where there is likely to be a prolonged scene times for whatever reason e.g. entrapment after an RTC
• Advanced triage including management of deteriorating situations
• Critical care including specialised patient monitoring
• They may transfer critically unwell patients between hospitals
• Provide advice to ambulance crews at the scene
I hope that gives you a small indication of what they are and how useful they are at the scene of some of the most serious incidents we attend.