Lumevia is not currently an emergency service. If you need urgent help now, call 112 or your local emergency service.
Port Harcourt · Emergency care research
In an emergency, the hardest part can be knowing where to go.
When someone collapses, falls or is suddenly unwell, families in Port Harcourt are often left to find a hospital, arrange transport and sort out payment all at once. Lumevia is researching whether a coordination service could carry some of that weight.
Anonymous, about 4 minutes. Please do not include medical records or personal health details.
01The reality
Decisions made in minutes, with very little to go on.
Most emergencies do not begin with a siren. They begin at home, at work or on the road, with a relative, a neighbour or a stranger who suddenly has to decide what happens next.
For many families, the plan is a phone and a private car. Someone calls a cousin who is a nurse. Someone else remembers a hospital that helped before. Each choice is made quickly, often without knowing whether it is the right one.
Lumevia wants to understand those minutes properly: what people actually do, where time is lost, and what would genuinely help.
02Where time is lost
Five things that can all need solving at once.
- 01
Finding a facility that can help
The nearest hospital is not always the right one. Families often decide on the move, using whatever they know or whoever answers the phone.
- 02
Knowing whether it is ready
Whether a bed, a doctor or the right equipment is available is usually discovered only on arrival. If not, the search starts again.
- 03
Getting there
Many families rely on their own car, a neighbour, or a taxi. Someone has to organise it while also looking after the patient.
- 04
Explaining what happened
Medications, allergies and history are often held in one relative's memory, and that relative may not be the one in the car.
- 05
Settling how care will be paid for
Deposits, HMO authorisation and calls to relatives who can help pay can all happen at the door, at the same time as everything else.
03Why a different approach
Families already know how to get moving. What is missing is someone working the phones for them.
Lumevia builds offline-first medical records software for Nigerian hospitals. That work keeps us close to the moment a patient arrives, and to everything that went into getting them there.
The idea we are exploring is simple: one call reaches a trained coordinator who checks which participating facility can receive the patient, helps arrange the next step, and lets the family focus on the person who needs them.
It would work alongside 112 and state emergency services, not replace them.
04The proposed service
How it would work, in four stages.
Stage 1
Request support
A patient or bystander calls or taps for help. A trained coordinator gathers only the information needed to act.
Stage 2
Coordinate the next step
Where time and circumstances permit, the coordinator seeks confirmation from an appropriate participating facility. A partner ambulance may be requested when necessary, subject to availability.
Stage 3
Prepare receiving care
The receiving facility may be alerted before arrival. Lumevia may help coordinate HMO, employer, sponsor or family authorisation.
Stage 4
Keep the family informed
Approved first-aid information may be shared while professional help is arranged, and relatives are kept updated.
It does not guarantee hospital acceptance, beds, doctors, ambulance availability, response times, free treatment or outcomes. This is a proposed service and has not launched.
05Beyond the four stages
Good coordination is measured in fewer wasted journeys.
If it works, a family would set off knowing where they are going, and the team there would know they are coming. Fewer journeys would end at a facility that cannot help. Relatives would hear what is happening instead of chasing updates.
None of that is possible without partners. The service depends on participating hospitals that agree to share readiness, transport partners who can respond, and HMOs and employers who can authorise care without holding up the door.
06Help shape the solution
Tell us what really happens when help is needed.
The survey takes about four minutes. You do not need a personal emergency experience to take part, and it does not ask for your name or contact details.
Lumevia is not yet an emergency service. In an emergency, call 112.
What the survey asks
- How you currently find emergency help, and who you call first
- What has stopped you, or someone you know, from reaching care
- Who you would trust to coordinate help
- What a service like this would be worth to you
Who can take part
Adults aged 18 or older in Port Harcourt, Rivers State and the rest of Nigeria, and Nigerians abroad who support relatives at home.
Your privacy
This page collects nothing. Survey answers are collected through Google Forms and stay anonymous. The early access list is a separate form. Please do not enter medical records, diagnoses, names, phone numbers or addresses in free-text answers.