TREK MEDICS INTERNATIONAL INC

Trek Medics International is a 501(c)(3)-registered organization that develops community-based "911" systems globally in communities that don't have them in order to reduce the incidence of premature death and disability from preventable causes. We do this through a comprehensive approach to emergency medical services (EMS) development that leverages pre-existing resources in the community to strengthen existing systems, whether formal or informal. Central to our approach is Beacon, an innovative, text message-based emergency dispatching platform designed specifically for communities where advanced, “Western” dispatching technologies are inappropriate or unaffordable. Beacon works by relaying requests for assistance via text message from the scene of an incident to trained community responders, and then coordinates their response to ensure patients can be located rapidly, assisted, and if necessary, transported to the nearest appropriate facility. Our goal is not to have these communities outsource their EMS systems to us. Rather, we offer them the tools and training to design, implement, manage, monitor, and sustain their own community-based systems. Started with generous seed funding from Google.org and USAID, Trek Medics has two live programs in the Dominican Republic and Tanzania providing 24/7 coverage to a total population of more nearly 200,000 persons, with nearly 400 incidents responded to since April 2015, and with responses taking place on a daily basis. We are honored to have our Dominican Republic program featured recently in BloombergBusinessweek: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-17/bringing-911-service-to-the-wilds-with-smartphones-and-scooters Our Tanzania program was also featured recently on an episode of CNN Vital Signs with Sanjay Gupta: http://trekmedics.org/blog/cnn-vital-signs-tanzania/.