Anyone, and everyone, can experience difficulties with mental health. During these turbulent times of the 2020-2021 pandemic mental health diagnosis has vastly increased, suicide rates have soared to devastating level, leaving a staggering shortage of resources for those who are affected.
In more severe cases, an individual struggling with mental health can utilize a behavioral health facility that focuses on the treatment of mental, social, and physical illness in children, adolescents, and adults. Behavioral health facilities can be freestanding entities, state institutions, or operated as a department of an acute care hospital. These facilities are located all over the United States, each providing specific and unique care to every kind of diagnosis.
Transporting Mental Health Patients
Patients with a behavioral or mental health disease may need to travel and be medically transported for several reasons. The most common case is to provide safe transport for mental health patients that needs to be moved from one behavioral health facility to another for either long-term care, more specialized care for their illness including a more skilled medical team, or rehabilitation. AirCARE1 works with case managers and social workers to execute these kinds of transports smoothly.
Other cases may involve a patient away from home or on vacation who had an unfortunate incident and needs to return home or to a new facility for recovery. These patients are not required to have been checked into a health facility prior to the flight. AirCARE1 provides private home medical transports to patients and families effected by chronic behavioral health diseases that included anxiety, aggressive disorders, PTSD, and even fear of flying.
Travelling via private Air Ambulance is a wise choice and often the only option to ensure the safety and medical well-being of patients with mental health challenges. Sometimes a commercial flight is not possible as these patients may cause a premature/emergency landing or need medical attention to make it through the duration of the long flight. Being transported on a Learjet air ambulance ensures the patient is transported quickly, has access to medical care the entire time, and stays in a safe and controlled environment.
AirCARE1 has partnered with many insurance providers and national behavioral health facilities as a trusted service provider. We make the process as easy and streamlined as possible to get these patients where they need to be to start their healing journey.
Treating a Patient During Transport
Caring for mental health patients during a medical air transport requires unique knowledge and training. We start our care through the education of our AirCARE1 team – validating that each patient with a mental or behavioral disease is different and in need of a specific targeted treatment plan. Our team of highly qualified medical professionals respect these patients with no discrimination or judgement. We accept all patient preferred pronouns, dietary requests, or even resting positions to help with safety and comfort in the aircraft. Additionally, our team utilizes holistic care including calming conversation, music, aroma therapy, and hand massages to further help our patients achieve peace of mind. Our crew has empathy and compassion for each patient while treating and transporting them.
There are more serious medical treatment considerations we face when transporting multiple behavioral health diseases. Our AirCARE1 medical team is equipped to transport patients that may require continuous medication administration, mechanical medical restraints, or even medical sedation. When medical sedation is required, we ensure that we are following evidence-based practice and providing vital stabilization mentally and hemodynamically. Adding crew members to these transports is also common to help mitigate risks for the safety of the patient, family, and crew team.
To be ready and prepared for any patient circumstance during a transport AirCARE1 has specific protocols that cover any safety and medical concerns that could arise. These protocols are reviewed and updated as frequently as needed to address new occurrences. Additionally, our Medical Director reviews and monitors every patient chart for quality improvement.
AirCARE1 is honored to help patients continue on their journey to recovery and healing. In many cases these delicate patients affect our crew members emotionally. AirCARE1 has a team that follows up with the facilities, patients/parents, and crew members to ensure proper debriefing of all members involved is done.
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We fully embrace and understand that mental health disorders can affect anyone at any point. We want to honor all the lives that have been lost to suicide among health care workers and others throughout the pandemic. Remember anyone can be at risk, many are in need, all need help, and we all can provide help together. Suicide hotline 1-800-273-8255.
