Residents trained on how to handle causalities

FIRST AID

If an accident happens before your presence and many people are affected, what do you do to save the life of the injured?

This is the question emergence medical providers answered yesterday during the mass casualty drill at Kololo Independence grounds.

The drill, organised by the Ministry of Health in partnership with emergency medical providers like Seed Global Health and Emergency Care Society of Uganda (ECSU), was to assess the response of institutions and individuals to mass casualty situations.

The conveners of the event, chose drama as the appropriate medium to show hundreds of spectators how they should respond to accidents and save lives in time.

Medical officers carrying an accident victim to a helicopter ambulance at a demonstration of mass causality drill that was organised by the ministry of health at Kololo independence grounds.

In the drama, the team created an accident scene involving seven cars and boda bodas, whereby 57 people are involved. Many of these are in a critical state, six deceased and a few have sustained simple injuries.

Here, one of the community members called traffic police and informed it about the emergency, which also drove to the scene and secured it with a ribbon. The fire brigade put off a fire at the scene and declared it safe.

Police also called the KCCA emergency response system that contacted nearby hospitals, mobilized ambulances and manpower.

These arrived at the scene and started triaging or sorting patient basing on how terrible their injuries or cases were.

These were given first aid, put in ambulances and taken to hospitals depending on how serious their cases were.

One of the patients was put onto a helicopter ambulance and flown to Nsambya hospital as he had sustained head injuries.

A traffic police officer checking on some of the victims during a demonstration of mass causality drill.

The whole demonstration took one hour, duration experts said was good and recommended by World Health Organization standards.

A traffic police officer checking on some of the victims during a demonstration of mass causality drill.

According to State Minister Primary Health Care, Joyce Kaducu the purpose of this exercise is to assess the response of institutions to a mass casualty situation; both at the site of the event and the site where medical care is administered using existing inter-institutional emergency and disaster plan.