The Uusimaa Medical Helpline serves more than one million residents in the region. In 2020, the professionals staffing the Medical Helpline took more than 200,000 phone calls and helped people with their urgent health issues.
We offer the Medical Helpline (tel. 116117) in all of Uusimaa except for Helsinki, as the City of Helsinki has a dedicated helpline for Helsinki residents.
Coronavirus pandemic increased call volume
In 2020, demand for the Medical Helpline grew by 27%, the coronavirus pandemic being a strong driver of demand. Despite this increase in volume, customer satisfaction remained high.
Services for special needs groups
In 2020, the Uusimaa Medical Helpline accepted national responsibility for certain specialist duties, such as providing a Medical Helpline captioning service for the hearing impaired and transferring calls without location data to the appropriate hospital area.
Concentration improves service
The Uusimaa Medical Helpline concentrated its activities in 2020. Most of the nurses in the Hyvinkää, Lohja and Porvoo hospital areas who had been working for the Medical Helpline as an outsourced service were made employees of HUS Akuutti, which is responsible for providing the Medical Helpline service.
“This centralization allowed us to build a better and more flexible operating model for the Medical Helpline,” says Hanna Vainio, service manager of the Uusimaa Medical Helpline.