Looking back, looking forward: 20/20 vision for AirMed International

The past year has been a milestone for AirMed. Looking back over 20 years in business, what do you see as the key take-aways for the company’s success?

Everything begins and ends with our people. That’s the same today as it was 20 years ago. We pride ourselves on providing the highest level of patient care, bedside to bedside, from wherever you are in the world, to home. That takes a lot of great people working closely together to make sure that our patients get the compassionate care they need in transit, and that there are no logistical problems that get in the way of that care – especially when we’re talking about repatriation and working within the constraints of foreign regulations and procedures.

So our pilots, our clinical crews, our communications and logistical experts have set the bar very high over a 20-year period. It’s our job moving forward to live up to – and even surpass – that legacy of commitment our team members have established. And we are always looking to add to this wonderful group of people with recruitment and retention programmes that let them know in no uncertain terms how much we – and our patients – value them.

 How do you quantify AirMed’s success over these past two decades?

First and foremost is the trust our customers/ patients put in us. This is difficult to quantify, but I see it all the time in the people who turn to us again and again. I think this is a testament to how, over many years, we have maintained a high level of excellence in terms of patient care and customer service. We set a standard of results and reliability that people have come to expect. Trust is hard to earn and easy to lose, so we are always working to build upon the goodwill of our customers and provide them with more and better options across the spectrum of our services.

Additionally, we’ve flown more than 25,000 missions in dozens of countries around the world, we’ve added to our clinical expertise with new equipment, protocols and procedures, we’ve expanded our bases to be able to better reach people, wherever they are, and we’ve built a fleet of permanently medically configured aircraft that are state-of-the-art and ready to go at a moment’s notice. You add all of these up, including our great team members, and you have all the elements for the success we have enjoyed.

Tell us about the prestigious accreditations you have received.

We are very proud to be recognised and fully accredited by the Commission on Accreditation of Medical Transport Systems (CAMTS), the European Aero-Medical Institute (EURAMI) and the US Department of Defense.

Our goal is always to try and go above and beyond the requirements – to proactively lead the way in new patient-care or safety protocols. It’s no coincidence that the Safety Management System (SMS) we initiated was one of the first ever to be recognised by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). We are always trying to stay ahead of the curve.

AirMed seems to be committed to innovating at all levels of the company. What drives this?

I’m not the first to believe that if you are not innovating, you are standing still. Growth is not just about physical expansion. We’ve certainly done that, growing our fleet and the number and locations of our bases. But on top of that you have to always be improving the baseline of your business: how do we care for patients better, how do we work with our hospital partners in a more efficient way, how can we keep doing this, not once, not twice, but repeatedly into the future?

We are proud that, currently, 20% of our pilots are female, well outpacing the national FAA certified figure of about 6%

One way is innovating clinically. We ask our Medical Directors to continually reassess our protocols and procedures, to add medical techniques and equipment, and to train our people in new and better methods. We see the fruition of these efforts every day in how we are able to provide continuity of care from sending hospital, to us, to receiving hospital – without any drop-off in the level of attention a patient receives. As hospitals can do more, so must we.

Technology is changing the way you do business – can you tell us more about this?

One of the biggest changes for AirMed over the past 20 years was becoming part of the Global Medical Response (GMR) family in 2018. Among other things, GMR has given us the resources to add incredible technological options on both the clinical and business sides of our organisation.

For example, just this year, we launched our new CAD system, AIRIS, that helps with clinical coordination, communications and dispatch, allowing for increased operational efficiencies. Also, from a customer standpoint, we’ve made ordering our services essentially a push-button service now for those partners that have our online ordering software. This is a time saver that helps hospitals move patients through their facilities, freeing up beds as well as the critical time of their caregivers. This is all back-end stuff that patients don’t generally see, but that they feel in terms of expedited transports and basic customer satisfaction.

You mentioned fleet and base expansions. How do these fit into your plans for the next 20 years?

We want to be where our patients need us – quickly and with the people and equipment to provide the right level of care at the right time. Currently, our expansion plans revolve around our Commercial Medical Transport offering (i.e. providing clinical and logistical support for patients who are well enough to use commercial travel like airlines or trains).

 And we are adding Singapore and Dubai to our sites from which we can work with patients on the amount of assistance they need.

More immediately, we are upgrading our fleet by replacing our Hawker 800 platform in 2025, transitioning to the Bombardier Challenger 605 airframe. This is a larger airframe with a significant increase from the Challenger in terms of operational range – a 20% increase, to be exact. Longer range means fewer stops and faster overall mission-completion times. We also partnered with Aerolite on the interiors of our new aircraft, making them roomier and better configured to treat patients in transit – so we’re getting patients back to their loved ones, or to a higher level of care, faster and more comfortably.

If you could predict what the next 20 years will look like for AirMed, what do you see?

I think the patient/customer side of things will be more of the same: listening to them, understanding how to make their experience with AirMed even better, and making those changes as we can.

On the business side, challenges always present themselves. For example, aviation industry experts are predicting a shortfall of pilots (as many as 30,000 in North America by 2032, according to some) due to mandatory and early retirements. So we are proactively looking to fill those future gaps by identifying ways to grow our talent pool.

We are proud that, currently, 20% of our pilots are female, well outpacing the national FAA-certified figure of about 6%. But women pilots remain an untapped resource, and we will continue to recruit and advocate for the advancement of women in this industry to meet the needs of patients.

We will also look for other sources of new talent, no matter their demographic. And it won’t just be for pilots. We know that shortages for Air Maintenance Technicians are predicted too. One thing we have learned over 20 years is that demand for clinically and operationally excellent patient transports only grows. We will always look for creative ways to meet that demand.