Mobile app that could save heart attack victims launched in Hungary

Hungary’s National Ambulance Service (OMSZ) has partnered with software developer Alerant Informatikai, the local charity of the Order of Malta and the Hungarian Resuscitation Society to create a mobile application that sends alerts to people who may be able to help heart attack victims on the street before paramedics arrive.

When emergency operators get a call about a possible heart attack victim on the street, they dispatch an ambulance and send the location of the victim to the app.

The app alerts people within a 500 metre radius of the victim, giving them a chance to start CPR even before the ambulance arrives.

Speaking at a press conference on European Restart a Heart Day, state secretary for health Zoltán Ónodi-Szűcs said the app, unique in Europe, is an exemplary product of cooperation between the civil and state sectors. He added that the odds of a heart attack victim surviving are greatly increased if somebody starts CPR before the arrival of the paramedics.

The app, dubbed SzívCity — “Heart City” — has been downloaded more than 5,000 times, said OMSZ spokesman Pál Győrfi.

The app works only Budapest at present, but a country-wide rollout is expected by year-end or early next year, Péter Domokos of Alerant Informatikai said.

Also we wrote about WIWE which is a new medical tool developed by Hungarians. WIWE can foretell the risks of stroke and sudden cardiac arrest. The small device and the application connected to it can save the lives of thousands.

Photo: MTI

Source: MTI