Health | 95 ambulances were called to non-critical emergencies

The majority of people who requested an ambulance were not in the first category of people in need of emergency service, according to the coordinator of Conde S. Januário Hospital emergency division, Chang Tam Fei.

During a call to a TDM radio show this week, Chang said that 95 percent of the people sent by ambulance to CHCSJ were only in a second-level emergency, and sometimes not even in emergency.

Chang explained that patients who were sent to the hospital’s emergency room by an ambulance were not immediately attended to just because they arrived by ambulance. The hospital provides medical treatment to patients based on the severity and urgency of their illness.

“Regardless of how they arrived at the hospital, we adopt the principle of fairness and long-practiced procedures in providing treatment,” declared Chang.

Currently, Macau is in the peak of flu season. Chang urged the public to use the Health Bureau’s mobile application to find out how many people are waiting at the emergency division in the hospital. He also mentioned that if the patients’ symptoms are mild or ordinarily uncomfortable, then those patients should go to a non-scheduled clinic in the health center or seek medical advice from a subsidized non-profit medical institution in order to avoid long waiting times and reduce the chance of cross-infection.