subject: The Definition Of Stat Service [print this page] When you're shipping something with a medical courier, if you have to meet a deadline that seems almost impossible to match, then what you want is something called STAT service. STAT is a term that the medical courier industry has borrowed from the medical industry proper, but its meaning is essentially identical. To request something STAT means to make it happen as fast as it is humanly possible to make it happen, so when you're up against a medical delivery deadline that is right around the corner, then you need a San Francisco courier service that can offer you STAT medical shipping.
STAT is a term that comes from the Latin for immediately, "statim". If you've ever watched a medical drama, then you've surely seen doctors running to and fro demanding that someone provide them with something "STAT". This is a term that is used in hospitals all the time to mean that an action has to be performed with the highest level of urgency that someone can manage, which has brought it into conventional usage in the medical courier industry.
Not all medical courier companies are going to have a STAT service option, so it is always good to look into this before you start shipping primarily with one company over another. Some companies simply don't have a large enough fleet or a significant enough infrastructure in order to be able to offer this kind of service. The larger medical couriers or those specializing in emergency deliveries are typically where you're going to have to go for STAT service.
STAT couriers have vehicles whose only purpose is to be ready in case a STAT delivery comes in. That is because these situations don't allow for the time that it would take to find a courier that was already out on the job and to dispatch them to a new pick up fast enough. Instead, there are vehicles in reserve so someone is always available to rush and make the delivery as fast as they can when this order comes in.
The need for speed in STAT deliveries is so great that they are not always completed by people using regular courier vehicles like vans. There are cases instead where a STAT delivery is completed by a helicopter instead. Many STAT couriers either have a helicopter or work with a helicopter pilot to provide the fastest delivery possible when medical materials need to be moved in a hurry.