THAMES Valley Air Ambulance is urging the public to prepare in case of a medical emergency by downloading the free location app called what3words.

The technology can accurately locate a patient’s whereabouts, which can help the charity to deliver potentially life-saving treatment faster when locations are hard to describe.

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The emergency medical provider wants people to use the app as it can precisely indicate where a patient is if they are in a remote area or somewhere with no obvious address or landmarks.

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It works like this, as explained by the app developers: 

"what3words is a really simple way to talk about location.

"We have assigned each 3m square in the world a unique 3 word address that will never change.

"For example ///filled.count.soap marks the exact entrance to what3words’ London headquarters.

"3 word addresses are easy to say and share, and are as accurate as GPS coordinates.

"Our vision is to become a global standard for communicating location.

"People use what3words to find their tents at festivals, navigate to B&Bs, and to direct emergency services to the right place."

Thames Valley Air Ambulance’s Critical Care Paramedic, Kurtis Poole said: "I once took a call from somebody who had found a severely injured horse rider. With no phone signal the caller had to run back to their house to use a landline and was unable to provide a specific location.

"We dispatched our crew to their house, but they still had to direct us to the patient’s location. In these situations, what3words can describe exactly where our help is needed, making sure we get our crew there as quickly and directly as possible.

"We urge you and your loved ones to download the what3words app to save us time in reaching you should you ever need our advanced medical care. It could be the difference between life and death when minutes really matter.”

To see what the words are for your location, check HERE

For more visit tvairambulance.org.uk