Ambulance Victoria (AV) celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Mobile Intensive Care Ambulance (MICA) last week (9 September), which paved the way for the world-class pre-hospital care Victorians receive today.
Chief Executive Officer of AV and MICA paramedic, Tony Walker said the Australian-first MICA service commenced operations in September 1971 as a three-month pilot with doctors and ambulance officers in a converted 1970s Dodge vehicle.
“Before long the MICA unit was responding without doctors on board and, within a few years, was attending 250 cases a month,” Professor Walker said.
“MICA was established in collaboration with the medical fraternity – a key factor behind the evolution of the paramedic profession in Victoria and our Statewide system of care that continues to this day,” he said.
“The advent of MICA brought coronary care and intensive care into the streets, homes and workplaces of Victorians who needed urgent medical help.”
Professor Walker said that rather than rushing patients to hospital, MICA brought hospital-level care to patients, with ambulance officers able to provide what was then ground-breaking treatment such as defibrillation for patients in cardiac arrest.
“The skills, training and clinical expertise of all Victorian paramedics, including Advanced Life Support (ALS) paramedics, had their foundations in the early days of MICA,” he said.
“Today’s MICA paramedics are highly skilled clinicians who perform treatments such as advanced airway management, manage complex head injuries and cardiac conditions and treat life-threatening chest injuries.”
Professor Walker said AV now had 600 MICA paramedics in metropolitan and rural regions and in its air ambulance response.
