Traffic safety has been one of the concerns for many car makers including General Motors. For years, their OnStar navigation system reports to the proper authorities incidences when one of their vehicles equipped with the navigation system deploys an airbag.
The ability of General Motors to pinpoint the location of the accident causing airbag deployment has cut the time between the time of the crash and the arrival of medical assistance. And recently, General Motors announced that they are improving their systems to provide better emergency crash responses.
Last Wednesday, the world's largest car manufacturer announced that they have entered into a partnership with the Centers for Disease Control Prevention and Prevention or the CDC. The partnership will be developing ways to make medical assistance to arrive at a crash scene faster to increase the survivability of traffic accident victims.
The federal agency, CDC, will be facilitating a meeting of the minds of more than twenty emergency medical physicians, trauma surgeons, public safety and vehicle safety experts. These experts on their field will be analyzing data from OnStar and other similar technology from other companies. These experts will review the data and come up with a solution to make medical response reach the victim faster and carry them to a facility that will be able to take care of these victims.
The General Motors Foundation and OnStar have made available a grant of $250,000 for the panel meetings. This shows that the auto maker is indeed looking out for its consumers just like a Nissan fuel filter looks after an engine.
Chet Huber, the president of OnStar, is clearly thrilled at the idea of partnering with the federal agency. "For more than 10 years OnStar has been proud to work hand-in-hand with local medical and public safety communities to create tools to help reduce traffic fatalities and extend needed emergency care," Huber says. "We are extremely excited to partner with the CDC Foundation and CDC in this ground breaking initiative that has the potential to dramatically impact the lives of our subscribers and all drivers," he added further.
Dr. Richard Hunt, the Director of CDC's Injury Center's Division of Injury Response, has this to say: "Providing emergency responders with vehicle crash information may help them make the appropriate field triage decisions, so crash victims can get to the right type of health care facility at the right time. CDC-supported research has shown that care at a trauma center lowers the risk of death by 25 percent for severely injured patients compared with treatment received at a hospital without trauma care services. We look forward to working with the expert panel in cooperation with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to better understand how to use this technology to help the emergency medical community save lives."
