Teams of First Specialized Medical Intervention (PRIME) of the Costa Rican Social Security Fund (CCSS), carried out, this Friday, two urgent air transfers of covid patients due to blockades on some national roads.
One of the operations was carried out by helicopter from the MonseƱor Sanabria hospital in Puntarenas and the other was carried out by plane from the La AnexiĆ³n hospital in Nicoya, Guanacaste, confirmed Dr. Max Alonso Morales Mora from the PRIME team of the specialized center for the care of patients with covid-19 (CEACO).
Both patients, a man and a woman, required specialized care at the Mexico hospital because they had severe respiratory failure. The two were transferred with intubation.
“We carried out two medical evacuation operations through air transport, due to the social situation that the country is experiencing in some communities and that, as a result of the blockades, do not allow transfers by land,” Morales said.
Each of these transfers requires the assistance of three people who travel both in the plane and in the helicopter. After landing at TobĆas BolaƱos airport, the operator of the emergency vehicle and a patient assistant join.
āEach air mobilization requires a physician specializing in emergency medicine, a highly trained nurse and a respiratory therapist from the PRIME team. Each transfer required a different mobile unit āhighlighted the coordinator of the First Specialized Medical Intervention.
For his part, Dr. Mario Ruiz Cubillo, medical manager of the CCSS, thanked the PRIME teams for their work and stressed that “this is part of the institutional work and planning in managing the pandemic.”
From March 2020 to date, 606 specialized transfer missions have been carried out by air, sea and land. There is zero mortality of the transferred patients and zero percent of the health professionals of the PRIME team infected by covid-19.
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