Queensland Emergency Medical System
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Welcome |  |
QEMS represents an integrated and coordinated system of care for the acutely ill and injured. It focuses on a systems, rather than organisational, approach to the delivery of patient care services.
This approach is necessary as emergency health care services are achieved through a series of focused sub-systems that include private and public health care providers and emergency services agencies. These sub-systems, as summarised below, operate within a complex and extensive network of arrangements that together form the Queensland Emergency Medical System (QEMS).
QEMS provides high quality primary health care, pre-hospital patient care and definitive medical care in Queensland through a continuum of care process, the basic elements of which are:
- Health Promotion and Injury Prevention;
- First Aid;
- A ‘000’ Access system;
- Response Coordination;
- First Responders;
- Pre-hospital Response, Care and Transport;
- Retrieval and Inter-hospital Transfers (IHT);
- Medical care; and
- Rehabilitation.
The aim of QEMS is a seamless model of emergency medical services that is efficient, effective and safe.
QEMS was established in 1997 as an interdepartmental framework to facilitate quality improvements to emergency medical services in Queensland.
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QEMS Symbol | |
Queensland Emergency Medical System
Trademark to Queensland Government
Through Department of Emergency Services
The QEMS Symbol represents a visual link between the service providers in emergency health care services in Queensland.
The caduceus over the ‘Star of Life’ is an internationally recognised symbol of emergency health care.
The caduceus is the more commonly used symbol of medicine. From mythology, it consists of the wand of Hermes entwined by two snakes. This version of the caduceus is used by the Queensland Ambulance Service to identify paramedics and their respective skill levels.
The ‘Star of Life’ was developed in the US during the 1970’s and much of the concept of emergency medical services systems (EMS) emerged at that time. The six bars of the cross represent elements of an EMS system:
- Detection
- Reporting
- Response
- On Scene Care
- Care in Transit
- Transfer to Definitive Care
Last updated 10 September 2004