Magen David Adom in Israel is the National Emergency Medical Service (EMS), the National Blood Service, and the National Red Cross Society for the state of Israel.

MDA serves more than 9.5 million inhabitants (the Israeli population) through 11 state-of-the-art operations centers with a highly advanced C4I system and a fleet of around 1,500 vehicles (basic and advanced life support ambulances, medical evacuation helicopters, and special operations appliances—all-terrain motorcycles) all tracked through localization systems. MDA has 3,500 staff members and 32,000 volunteers who respond to about 3,500 calls for assistance daily. Its blood services recruit the donor, collect the unit, test it, store it, and provide the different blood products to the hospitals. This is achieved through a state-of-the-art system for 1,000 blood units per day.

MDA has the responsibility to prepare for, respond to and learn from all health-related emergencies. As the national EMS and National Red Cross society, Magen David Adom is involved in preparing for and responding to various disasters (conflict-related, natural and technological) by preparing the protocols, purchasing the equipment, training staff, volunteers and the communities, and by working with the communities on their resilience and response capacities. Pre-positioning of stocks and supply chains to ensure prompt and efficient response to national and international disasters is of particular interest for MDA.

 

In the ESCORT project, MDA serves as an end-user partner. MDA’s role is as a contributor and task leader, leading a task on integrated treatment solutions between ambulance and emergency healthcare professionals with the goal of building operational resilience between the patient services offered by ambulance personnel and the treatment offered by emergency department personnel. MDA also contributes to the work on organizational review of operational readiness for emergency medicine and healthcare services and on integration and demonstration of cross-border emergency medicine and regular healthcare services.

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