COVID-19 Pandemic and the challenges of pre-hospital emergency services in Iran: a systematic review
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Abstract
Introduction: Emergency medical service (EMS) systems faced numerous challenges and issues as the frontline in dealing with the global Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. This systematic review aimed to prepare a guideline for managing future pandemics by exploring the challenges emergency medical technicians face in providing pre-hospital care during the COVID-19 pandemic. Material and methods: This study followed the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. PubMed, Web of Science (WOS), Scopus, ProQuest, Embase, Science Direct, and Google Scholar were the primary databases used to search for literature. The keywords used in this review were COVID-19, “Prehospital Emergency”, and Iran, and their equivalents, obtained from MeSH, expert opinion, or related articles. From the 787 records identified through database searching in the early stage, after investigating, analysing the characteristics, and content analysis, 11 articles were included in the final stage of this review study to answer the study questions. Results: Based on the searches, 11 articles were finally evaluated. Challenges extracted from the analysis of studies were classified into 5 main themes, 12 subthemes, and 50 codes. The main themes include Ambiguity in operational protocols, Resource Shortage, Cultural challenges, Burnout, and Physical and Mental health challenges. Conclusions: The outbreak of COVID-19 has presented challenges for pre-hospital emergency services (PHES) in Iran, necessitating adaptive strategies and coordinated efforts by authorities to prepare EMS for similar crises in the future.
Keywords: COVID-19pre-hospital emergency serviceIran
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