HELP Flight is an air medical transport program offered by St. Vincent Healthcare of Billings, Montana.

Since 1979, the HELP (Helicopter Emergency Lifesaving Program) Flight air ambulance program has provided air transportation for seriously ill or injured patients.

Our goal is to work with medical and rescue personnel throughout the region to ensure the safe and expedient transport of patients needing additional medical resources.

Types of Transports

  • Adult and pediatric patients with medical illness or trauma related injuries transported from hospitals, clinics, and accident scenes.
  • High risk pregnancies, premature and full term babies in need of specialty care.

Who We Serve

HELP Flight provides rapid air transportation and advanced life support care to patients at the transport scene and en route to medical facilities. We serve outlying physicians and hospitals; emergency medical and law enforcement personnel; and residents of rural communities, farms and ranches.

Service Area Includes:

  • Central Montana
  • South Central Montana
  • Eastern Montana
  • Northern Wyoming
  • Western North and South Dakota
  • As well as fixed-wing transports to anywhere in the continental U.S.

We work collaboratively with medical professionals in other communities, coordinating the transport and care of patients in time-critical situations. If the need for transport is uncertain, one of our Emergency department physicians is available for consultation.

In 2020 our HELP Flight Team was granted full Commission on Accreditation of Medical Transport Systems (CAMTS) accreditation for the next three years. The CAMTS is dedicated to improving the quality of patient care and safety of the transport environment for services providing rotorwing, fixed wing and ground transport systems.

The Flight Team

Our flight team includes:

  • Flight Registered Nurses
  • Flight Paramedics
  • Flight Respiratory Therapists
  • Neonatal and Maternal Flight Nurses
  • Flight Communications Specialists
  • Pilots and mechanics

The flight RNs and paramedics are specially trained and experienced in critical care and emergency pre-hospital transport. This team is trained to provide care to adult as well as pediatric patients.

The HELP Flight team is based at the St. Vincent Healthcare emergency department and is under the medical direction of a staff of board-certified emergency physicians.

The neonatal team, which is comprised of specially trained neonatal nurses and respiratory therapists, is under the medical control of a board certified neonatologist. A highly trained obstetrics nurse and the adult team fly under the direction of a perinatologist to bring women with high risk pregnancies to the labor and delivery unit.

The HELP Flight team is on call 24 hours a day, ready to respond to emergency calls and hospital-to-hospital transports.

The Aircraft

The St. Vincent Healthcare air medical program includes both a fixed-wing aircraft and a helicopter, which respond to an emergency call as soon as it is received. The fixed-wing aircraft, a Beechcraft Super King Air B-250 with a backup Beechcraft Super King Air 200, can transport patients throughout the country. The aircraft can transport one adult patient or up to two isolettes with two pilots and up to three medical personnel in attendance. It cruises in excess of 25,000 feet at 350 miles per hour.

The helicopter, a Eurocopter EC 135, is a fully equipped twin engine air ambulance that accommodates a patient, two medical attendants and the pilot. It can transport patients within a 150 mile radius of Billings. Patients are flown to the hospital of their, or their physician’s, choice. 

Department of Transportation

The FAA Reauthorization Act of 2018 requires Air Ambulance Providers to include the hotline telephone number (202.366.2220), website address (https://www.transportation.gov/airconsumer/), and contact information (Aviation Consumer Protection Division, C-75, US Department of Transportation, 1200 New Jersey Ave, SE, Washington, DC 20590) for the Department of Transportations (DOT) Aviation Consumer Advocate on any invoice, bill, or other communication to a customer or patient.