With the great progress of the economy, the level of industrialization has been increasing year by year, which leads to an increase in accidental trauma accidents. Chinese annual death of trauma is already more than 400 000, which makes trauma the fifth most common cause of death, following malignant tumor, heart, brain and respiratory diseases. Trauma is the leading cause of the death of young adults. At the same time, trauma has become a serious social problem in peacetime. Trauma throws great treats on human health and life. As an important part in the medical and social security system, the emergency of trauma system occupies a very important position in the emergency medical service system. In European countries as well as the United States and also many other developed countries, trauma service system had a long history, and progressed to an advanced stage. However, Chinese trauma service system started late and is still developing. It has not turned into a complete and standardized system yet. This review summarizes the histories and current situations of the development of traumatic first aid system separatedly in European countries, the United States and our country. Special attentions are paid on the effects of the pre- and in-hospital emergency care. We also furtherly try to explore the Chinese trauma emergency model that adapts to the situations of China and characteristics of different regions of China. Our rievew also introduces the trauma service system that suits the situations of China proposed by Prof. Jiang Baoguo’s team in details, and taking Chinese conditions into account, they conducted a thematic study and made an expert consensus on pre-hospital emergency treatment of severe trauma, providing a basic rountine and guididance of severe trauma treatment for those pre-hospital emergency physicians. They also advised the establishment of independent trauma disciplines and trauma specialist training systems, and to build the regional trauma care system as well as the standards for graded treatment, thus establishing a multiple disciplinary team (MDT) of severe trauma. In this way, we can reduce the mortality and disability risks of severe trauma, improve the quality of patients’ life, and save more lives.