In 2019, the World Health Assembly declared emergency care essential to achieve the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. Few sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries have developed robust approaches to sustainably deliver emergency medical services (EMS) at scale, as high-income country models are financially impractical. Innovative reassessment of EMS delivery in resource-limited settings is necessary as timely emergency care access can substantially reduce mortality.
Though the disease burden addressable by prehospital and out-of-hospital emergency care(OHEC) spans communicable diseases, maternal conditions, chronic conditions and injury, the single largest disability-adjusted life year burden contributor is injury, primarily driven by road traffic injuries(RTIs). Establishing OHEC for RTIs and other common emergencies in low- and middle-income countries(LMICs) where the injury burden is disproportionately greatest is a logical first step toward more comprehensive emergency medical services(EMS). However, with limited efforts to formalize and expand existing informal bystander care networks, there is a lack of consensus on how to develop and maintain bystander-driven Tier-1 EMS systems in LMICs. Resultantly, Tier-1 EMS development is fragmented among non-governmental organizations and the public sector globally.
