WAS_SafetyFirst_6_EN

26 The distance between the Ugandan capital Kampala and the WAS headquarters in Emsbüren, Lower Sa- xony, is approximately 6,250 kilometers as the crow flies - no great distance for Julius Nduguyangu Mu- gisha. The CEO of LIMEAR Life Medical Rescue Ser- vices in Uganda has already travelled to almost every country in the world as part of his previous work for the United Nations. However, the “aha” moment that ignited the spark for his own company came very close to home, in The Hague in the Netherlands. During a business trip there, he fell ill with a respiratory infec- tion that developed into severe pneumonia within a few days. So weakened, at some point all that remained was to dial the emergency number. Rescue came in the form of two highly equipped vehicles, a fast responder and an emergency am- bulance, whose crews were able to start artificial respiration immediately. Julius only survived the dicey situation thanks to the rapid intervention and state-of-the-art medical techno- logy. An experience that changed his life. “If the rescue team hadn’t been on the scene within a very short time, I wouldn’t have made it. That impressed me and made me focus on the rescue service. I thought about how medical care is organised in my home country of Uganda and wanted to help provide the same service there”, says Julius, describing the origi- nal idea. The fact that every second counted for him back then is ex- pressed in LIMEAR’s slo- gan: “When every second counts!” “We need to raise awareness of the importance of rescue services.” Just six years later, his medical and ambulance service has been successfully established in Uganda. He started with three second-hand ambulances from the Netherlands, two of which were WAS vehicles. This is how his first contact with WAS came about. Julius was impressed by the quality and durability of the WAS ambulances under the difficult conditi- ons in Uganda. One WAS vehicle is in use as a VIP/MICU am- bulance. Today, with 15 emergency vehicles and a team of 32 staff dispatchers in the operations control center, emergency and intensive care paramedics, emergency medicine specia- lists and trauma doctors, LIMEAR offers medical services for companies, organisations and private individuals. In addition to emergency rescue, this also includes first aid training, me- dical flight services, inter-facility transfers and on-site emer- gency support for major events such as concerts or sporting events, remote medical support, medical staffing to men- tion but a few. LIMEAR ambulances are deployed through- out Uganda: For remote medical support for various compa- nies, for patient transport between hospitals and, above all, as mobile critical care ambulances. In this way, Julius crea- ted care structures that are now being established throughout Uganda. “The public ambulance service here is undergoing restructuring, or rather optimisation. Awareness of the import- ance of the emergency services is not yet very pronounced. A large proportion of the population is not even aware that am- bulances do not just transport patients, but they are hospitals on wheels and that their crews can do even more than what can be done in hospitals thus LIMEAR’s principle of taking the hospital to the patient than rushing the patient to the hos- pital”, says Julius, describing the situation on the ground, ad- ding: “During the coronavirus pandemic, we managed to ven- tilate a patient for three days and provide him with intensive care using this mobile solution so that he survived, thanks to the alternating deployment of three ambulances. These are the successes that make all the work worthwhile.” And Julius would like to see much more of this, but a lot still needs to be done. For example, coordination between the hospitals. The communication chain from the scene of the emergency to the LIMEAR does pioneering work with their own control centers, efficient technology and a well- trained team.