Zachranka App: Giving a Direct Line to the Emergency Services

When it comes to an emergency, time matters. Using technology, we can help speed up medical team response times. For example, in the UK we’ve been exploring how emerging tech like Edge Computing can help hospitals prep for incoming incidents by streaming data live from the site and ambulance, and in Romania we’ve seen the impact drones powered by 5G can have in mountain rescue operations. Knowing the exact location of an incident can save huge amounts of time for the emergency services.

Vodafone Foundation’s Zachranka app is helping people in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia and Austria, connect directly to the emergency services and are using location tracking to speed up how quickly they are found.

Through the app, your location can be sent directly to the emergency services and you will be connected directly to the right emergency department – all at the click of a button. If you can’t talk, there are also icon options to help you communicate your injury.

As a first of its kind, Zachranka has also implemented video calls into the emergency calling process. A feature that has already been implemented in Czech Republic and is now under deployment in Hungary.

For Inka Zuzaňáková, a biomedical engineer at University Hospital Bulovka, the app is making a huge difference in how they reach and treat children injured at scout camp, and for horse-riding enthusiast Martina Davidová, it meant she could get help fast when she was lost, alone and badly injured.

Often working in the forest, we caught up with Inka to hear more about how this app supports her job.

In January, Martina Davidová found herself alone and hurt, surrounded by woods, fields and meadows with no idea where she was. Here she tells us how the app helped her get the urgent medical care she needed.

Having reached three million users so far, and with 150,000 emergency calls made, our goal is to expand Zachranka, further improving the dispatch of land, air, mountain and water rescue services throughout the Czech Republic, Austria and Hungary, the Slovakian mountains and further afield.

By investing in the betterment of the communities in which Vodafone operates, we believe our technology can make a difference.

Source: Vodafone media announcement