In emergency care, loss of life means loss of trust in healthcare system.

In India, emergency medical care has until recently been a neglected area of expertise. In recent times, emergency transport through 108 ambulance service has been scaled up rapidly. However, there has not been a commensurate improvement in skills of health care providers and public safety professional and citizen volunteers in emergency life support skills. This unmet need is barely met by a few institutions which either teach curricula developed in western countries that are expensive, specialty focus and often not reflective of Indian needs, or curriculum developed locally which are not standardized and accredited by statutory bodies.

To address this gap, in June 2014, JeevaRaksha program was initiated collaboratively by Karnataka State Health University - Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences (RGUHS), and Swami Vivekananda Youth Movement, Mysuru in technical collaboration with University of Utah, USA. The team conducted needs assessment among primary healthcare centres and other providers (including private sector) who are the first point of contact in the health care system in medical and trauma emergencies. This stressed on the need of the curricula to be broad based and address all common emergencies that they encounter, viz, Cardiac, Respiratory, Obstetric, Paediatric including Neonates, Trauma, Burns, Poisoning including animal and insect Bites.

JeevaRaksha course focuses on recognizing and managing critical illness that are common in Indian setting as mentioned above. This is not only India’s first Comprehensive Emergency Care and Life Support Training Course for medical doctors (for both primary practitioners and specialists) but also the FIRST University recognized Emergency Care Skills Certificate program in the World.

The program was formally inaugurated on 23rd June 2014 by the then Honourable Governor of Karnataka Dr Hansraj Bhardwaj and was attended by Dr Vedprakash Mishra, the then Chairman of Academic Committee of Medical Council of India.

The Course was piloted in Morocco and Uzbekistan too. This helped us understand that the courses are not only equally relevant to the context of Other Asian, African and East European nations but also perceived their hunger for the same. Thus, RGUHS-JeevaRaksha Program has the potential to be exported to other developing countries as an Indian model.

Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences along with Swami Vivekananda Youth Movement created JeevaRaksha Trust as a special purpose vehicle to rapidly scale up the program across Karnataka and India while maintaining the highest standards of quality education, research and training.