The use of air medical services has become an essential component of the health care system. Appropriately used, air medical critical care transport saves lives and reduces the cost of health care. It does this by minimizing the time that the critically injured and ill spend out of the hospital, by bringing more medical capabilities to the patient than are normally provided.

While the public primarily pictures a helicopter landing at a car crash to help a victim with multiple injuries, in the last decade air medical services have increasingly taken on a variety of new missions. In fact, 54% of all air medical transports are hospital to hospital, 33% is scene responses, and 13% are other types (e.g., organ procurement, and specialty/neonatal/ pediatric team transportsą.

Bringing a family member home known as repatriation and/or transporting patients to specialized medical care, is just one of the many uses and benefits of Golden State Air Ambulance advanced life support aircraft.