Département du Gard is located in Southern France. There was 745 458 resident in 2018.
Major cities ar located near the coastline, while upper part of the department is mostly rural.
The main city of the département is Nîmes with 149 633 habitant in the city. The second is Alès with 40 802 habitant.
The service that manage medical emergencies in Gard is called SAMU - Service d'Aide Médicale Urgente (Emergency Medical Service). It is based in Nimes's hospital, just above the SMUR's station.
This service is managed by a regulation doctor who decide which emergengy needs ambulance and wich do not.
To accomplish those missions, SAMU request the use of ambulances to differents partners such as firefighters, private ambulance company and rescue association.
Firefighters in France have they own Emergency response vehicle. They can dispatch ambulances to emergency calls but if there is an injured person, they must report to the SAMU.
There is 30 firehouses located all around Gard. There is at least one ambulance per firestation.
In term of medical response, firefighters can deploy :
VSAV : Véhicule de Secours et d'Assistance aux Victimes (RTW)
This vehicle is equipped with 3 firefighters. It deals with all regular emergencies and can transport patients if needed. They are not used for non urgent medical transport. This is the mission of private ambulances companies. They do it only if there is no private ambulance available.
VLI : Véhicule Léger Infirmier (NEF)
This vehicle is equipped with 1 firefighter and 1 emergency care nurse. They can manage medical emergencies with more heavy injured patient. They can also be dispatched prior to doctor to administer first medication before doctor comes on scene. In game, this vehicle is represented as a regular NEF.
VLM : Véhicule Léger Médicalisé (NEF)
There is 1 doctor and 1 firefighter in this vehicle. It deals with medical situation and heavily injured patient.
Sometimes, there is patient that needs doctor before getting transported. Hospital also have they own medical doctor to send to the scene. They work with firefighters on scene and most of the time they have a more "complete" vehicle.
VLM SMUR : Véhicule de Liaison Médicalisé (NEF)
This vehicle is equipped with Doctor, Nurse and a ambulance driver. They have a lot of medical equipement if needed.
AR SMUR : Ambulance de Réanimation (NAW)
This véhicule is used to transport injured from hospital to hospital or sometimes to bring people from the scene of the emergency to the hospital. As they are fully equipped with a Doctor, nurse and ambulance driver equipage, they only do Intensive care transport.
F-HOCN : Sinus (ITH)
This helicopter is used for long distance emergency response or log distance hospital transport. It can't do "dangerous" rescue operation.
In france, private ambulances usually does non-urgent medical transport. But now, private are beginning to do emergency transport. They are doing some shift in main cities of the departement.
KTW :
Those are private company that are not on shift for urgent medical responses.
(AMU) :
Private company that are ready for emergency call. Private company only uses 2 people in ambulances so they are more used for private place emergencies.
