The cooperation agreement means that paramedics receive clearer directives regarding when they should contact the municipality’s home health care or the health centers in Tingsryd or Ryd in order to follow up a patient who has been visited by an ambulance, but who did not need to accompany them to hospital.
But it can also mean that the staff at the ambulance in Tingsryd helps the municipality make a medical assessment of a patient.
– For example, it could be that they call us, and if the ambulance in Tingsryd is free at that time, our staff can go out and help, says Fredrik Dahlberg, operations manager for the ambulance in Kronoberg.
Want fewer people to go to the hospital
The project is part of the transition to what is known as close care, which aims for more people to receive medical help at home. Today, approximately 25 percent of all ambulance visits end with the patient remaining at home. There is no stated goal regarding how much that percentage should increase, but Fredrik Dahlberg is clear that this is one of the aims of the collaboration.
– The goal is for more patients to be able to be cared for at home, if they are not in need of hospital care.
How much will the patient’s own will come into play here, if they don’t feel safe staying at home?
– It is a prerequisite that you feel safe staying at home. The finesse of this model is that, if necessary, home health care can follow up, or that we have a system for how the health center can take over, says Fredrik Dahlberg.
In the clip, you hear Fredrik talk about a concrete example of what the collaboration can look like.