Tokyo, Japan, June 15, 2018—Full-scale implementation of the advanced automatic collision notification system D-Call Net^® is now underway at approximately 730 locations within Japan. A trial service has been ongoing since November 2015, whereby base hospitals and air ambulances have prepared systems to transmit fatal and serious injury probability data from vehicles to all fire departments within the trial area. The certified non-profit organization Emergency Medical Network of Helicopter and Hospital (HEM-Net), Toyota Motor Corporation (Toyota), Honda Motor Co., Ltd., (Honda), and Japan Mayday Service Co., Ltd. (HELPNET) have cooperated on this project.

At the start of the trial, there were 10 cooperating hospitals in 9 prefectures (with 9 air ambulances), and now, there are 42 hospitals in 31 prefectures (with 37 air ambulances). This is equivalent to approximately 70 percent of the total 61 base hospitals with air ambulances nationwide (including base/cooperating hospitals). In addition to planning further expansion of cooperating hospitals, the system will be made more effective by improving data transmission methods to hospitals.

As new service providers, Bosch Service Solutions (Bosch) and Premier Aid Inc. (Premier Aid) will participate in D-Call Net^® to make preparations for the start of service. With vehicle connectivity rapidly progressing, the service will be expanded to more vehicles as a Japan-wide initiative, including customers with imported vehicles.

Message from HEM-Net Chairman of the Board Nobuo Shinoda, D-Call Net^® representative organization

“The key to emergency medical treatment for people seriously injured in traffic accidents is provision of the necessary treatment as quickly as possible. For that reason, to accurately and promptly implement a ‘traffic accident – transportation – start of medical treatment’ cycle, HEM-Net, Toyota, Honda, and Japan Mayday Service conducted a trial operation of D-Call Net^® for approximately two years starting in November 2015. With cooperation from the relevant agencies such as fire departments and hospitals, a system has now been put in place for the full-scale start of nationwide operation. Trial results show that D-Call Net^® can reduce air ambulance dispatch time by 17 minutes. With planned participation from Bosch and Premier Aid, we want to contribute to an improvement in the number of lives saved throughout Japan by introducing D-Call Net^® support into as many vehicles as possible.”

The D-Call Net^® operation system and other details are shown below. 

D-Call Net^®, commonly referred to as an AACN (Advanced Automatic Collision Notification), is an advanced automatic collision notification system that uses vehicle connectivity technology. It estimates the probability of fatal and serious injuries by making an automatic analysis of data from both vehicles in an accident based on approximately 2.8 million accident data cases in Japan. The aim is to increase the number of lives saved after traffic accidents by making immediate dispatch decisions with air and ground ambulances through reporting to fire departments and cooperating hospitals.