It was May 3, 2004 when Dr. Pietro Petrillo was entrusted with the direction of Basilicata Soccorso, the Emergency/Urgency service established by regional law n° 21 of 03.03.1999. Structured on a regional basis and based on the functional integration between the health alarm system, the territorial rescue system, the network of hospital facilities dedicated to emergencies/urgency, the management was entrusted, on an experimental basis, to the newly created management body which it provided for its exercise in an associated form between the Healthcare and Hospital Trusts of the Basilicata Region.
“From that day, in Basilicata, all citizens in need of medical assistance will have to call the single toll-free telephone number 118. From that moment, therefore, hospital telephone numbers will no longer have to be made for health emergency calls. ” This was what Petrillo communicated during a meeting which formalized the start of the service which he would coordinate until November 2005.
On 1 October 2009, DIRES, the Intercompany Department of Health Emergency, was established and Basilicata Soccorso was abolished. The new unitary operational structure was responsible for the organization and management of the regional emergency/urgency network.
Petrillo was replaced in 2005 by Dr. Libero Mileti, the current director, who directed it until 2015, the year in which the direction passed to Dr. Diodoro Colarusso who took over the leadership for the following 3 years. Doctor Serafino Rizzo was the acting until 1 October 2023 when the management of the Emergency Department – 118 Basilicata returned to Mileti.
The Basilicata region was the last region in Italy to activate the 118 service and since then it has taken steps to satisfy the emergencies/urgent situations of the entire regional territory.
Numerous rescue operations were carried out, ensuring so-called time-dependent pathologies such as acute coronary syndromes, stroke and severe polytrauma. Its organization on the territory, divided into an operations centre, two helicopters, one of which is also night-time, seven district hospitals and 39 territorial stations allows it to guarantee a qualified presence throughout the entire regional territory.
A new branch of 118 has been added: that of Viggiano. An operations center active 24 hours a day in the municipal premises in via Marconi, renovated and brought up to standard, suitable for the functions that will take place there.
