RESCUE helicopter campaigners are hoping talks with the Metropolitan Ambulance Service this week will boost their push for a south-west-based chopper. The meeting is the first time since 2001 that the MAS, which oversees the state's air ambulance service, has come to the south-west to discuss its emergency dispatch system. Garvoc resident Dominique Fowler, whose daughter Alycia died after a car accident in December, 2006, and Keith Meerbach, whose sister-in-law Carolyn is still recovering from serious head injuries sustained when she was hit by a car near Portland in August, will attend the meeting on Wednesday. Local medicine professionals will also attend the discussion. MAS general manager of operations Keith Young will join chief executive officer Greg Sassella as well as Dr Marcus Kennedy, the new medical director of Adult Retrieval Victoria.Adult Retrieval Victoria, a statewide air-ambulance dispatch system designed to reduce response times, was launched in November last year. Mrs Fowler said MAS could have a huge input as to whether or not the region secured its own helicopter. "It gives us the opportunity to voice what the people of south-west Victoria have wanted and needed for a very long time," she said. "You can't achieve the patient retrieval process that we need here in the south-west unless we have a dedicated rescue chopper," she said. "They can implement all these lovely little Melbourne-based strategies all they like but they're only talking minutes. We need a reduction in hours."Mrs Fowler wanted to see average patient retrieval times for people in the south-west reduced from about six hours to less than two hours.Mr Young said the Warrnambool meeting was an extension of talks held with the chopper lobby after the rally at Parliament House in February when a petition bearing more than 20,000 names was presented to the State Government. "We see some significant changes coming for the future with respect to how we retrieve patients across the state," Mr Young said."We're not coming down to make any promises to these people. "It's really just about making them understand what we're able to do within the confines of the system." The talks will help inform the advice MAS gives to the Government over future ambulance funding.