Ambulance service response times 'going seriously wrong'

5:04pm Monday 28th January 2013 in News Photograph of the Author By Adam Binnie, Senior Reporter

Firefighters have accused the ambulance service of "trying to fix a gaping wound with a sticking plaster" as the wait for paramedics gets longer and longer.

Police officers have also criticised the service, claiming they have been forced to use their cars as makeshift ambulances to take people to hospital.

This comes just weeks after paramedics contacted the Watford Observer, claiming the ambulance service was "in a state of collapse".

Keith Handscomb, from East Anglia Fire Brigades Union, said: "Fire crews are telling us something is going seriously wrong with the 999 response of the East of England ambulance service.

"Paramedic colleagues have told us privately about their concerns, but they are afraid to speak out.

"They tell us that ambulance trust is finding ever-more dubious ways to tick the boxes in trying to meet their performance targets, while caring less and less about the standard of medical response."

In January the Watford Observer reported how the East of England Ambulance NHS Trust is facing a £50million cut over five years, while logging an extra 20 per cent of 999 calls during 2012.

There was an increase in the number of people in Hertfordshire waiting more than half an hour for an ambulance, from 37 in December 2011, to 376 in November 2012.

The trust is hoping to solve the delays by hiring 140 new staff, and by bringing in better rotas and improved communication with hospitals, to reduce handover times.

Mr Handscomb added: "Something needs to be done but looking for a sticking plaster to treat a gaping wound is not the answer.

"For those who find themselves in medical emergencies, this is a matter of life and death importance."

Mr Handscomb also suggested the ambulance trust had sent private ambulances to car crashes where none of the crew had the medical skills needed to deal with the emergency.

He added: "Casualties are waiting longer for the arrival of ambulances, and when a paramedic does arrive, they are often on their own in a car and are unable to take seriously injured casualties to hospital.

"Fire officers tell us of their desperate frustration at being told to wait in line when chasing up emergency requests for the attendance of an ambulance.

"Sometimes they are told the ambulance sent to their emergency has been redirected to another call due to there being no other ambulance available."

Vojislav Mihailovic, general secretary of Hertfordshire Police Federation, echoed these concerns, and said he was aware of police officers being called upon to transport patients to hospital when no ambulance was available.

More worryingly, he said, was the growing number of officers who were being called upon to medically assess injured or ill patients.

Mr Mihailovic added: "Police officers are now expected to make a medical decision whether someone is seriously injured or not. They are not trained medics.

"If you move someone who is injured and it worsens the condition, the police officer will end up under investigation rather than properly trained medical professionals.

"We are an emergency service, and we are suffering budget cuts the same as everyone else."

Lorna Marsh, from the ambulance trust, argued that the most common incidents to require all three emergency services were road traffic collisions, the majority of which did not cause serious injury.

She suggested long delays were often down to patients being classed as a non-emergency, rather than a lack of ambulances.

She added: "We have already revealed plans to improve our response times with a raft of measures.

"It is important to remember response targets are set from between eight minutes to an hour according to thoroughly assessed clinical need.

"While a longer target may not be ideal for police and fire crews, it means those in life-threatening situations are prioritised, similar to the way they are at A&E, to get life-saving help first."

Comments(23)

Roy Stockdill says...
5:56pm Mon 28 Jan 13

Hmmmmm......

Methinks that when two of the major emergency services start pitching into the third one with clearly very heavy criticism on the record, then something is very seriously wrong.

It seems to be the old box-ticking nonsense of having to meet targets that is raising its ugly head yet again.

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crazyfrog says...
6:29pm Mon 28 Jan 13

Roy Stockdill wrote:
Hmmmmm......

Methinks that when two of the major emergency services start pitching into the third one with clearly very heavy criticism on the record, then something is very seriously wrong.

It seems to be the old box-ticking nonsense of having to meet targets that is raising its ugly head yet again.
i totally agree Roy this is very worrying indeed ! i just hope nobody loses their life over these cut-backs if they do can we expect a bean counter who made these decisions being prosecuted?

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Mohandas says...
6:55pm Mon 28 Jan 13

Roy Stockdill wrote:
Hmmmmm......

Methinks that when two of the major emergency services start pitching into the third one with clearly very heavy criticism on the record, then something is very seriously wrong.

It seems to be the old box-ticking nonsense of having to meet targets that is raising its ugly head yet again.
Agreed.

This target driven culture is corrupting and is not delivering quality except bullying managers who are after flag waving performance data for their bosses.

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Vicar*o*rage says...
7:16pm Mon 28 Jan 13

It is so typical of Dopey Dave Scameron and the Tory Conning Govt to rip of those in need and allow Big Business and wealthy to evade paying their due taxes, The poor, sick, disable suffer because of this Government

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volvov50 says...
7:43pm Mon 28 Jan 13

So what Lorna Marsh is saying its alright to keep other emergency Services tied up for hours as they have nothing better to do And why use a Private ambulance service all the way from Lincolnshire (Human Touch) every day to prop up the NHS Ambulance Service. Just to warn the readers the response time if you fall in the house or in the street and unable to move is up to 4 YES FOUR hours. And alla Ambulance crews have to have a break so dont call for one between 1130 and 1400 hours

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UndercoverElephant says...
8:27pm Mon 28 Jan 13

Part of the problem is massive cuts & closures to A and E depts, causing significant delays in transferring care of patients to hospitals, thereby freeing crews for their next job. I know of at least one crew waiting 5 hours at Watford today.

However, that aside, the ambulance service is being run into the ground and the criticisms of the Fire service and the Police are justified. Fewer crews, new staff not trained in the way they should be (& used to be), equipment shortages etc etc all to save money.

Yes, times are hard, but try telling that to someone who's relative is dying in front of them because there are no ambulances available.

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LSC says...
1:48am Tue 29 Jan 13

What frightened me was a little story on here the other day. There was a motorway accident up near junction 6. The air ambulance couldn't land due to weather, so they were sending a doctor to the scene by road.... FROM LONDON.

Now I know London borders are just up the road, but the major hospitals aren't. Barnet or Stanmore maybe? (Does Stanmore still have trauma doctors?) Perhaps Northwick Park. I might be making a fuss over nothing, but it worries me the nearest trauma qualified available doctor was so far away, and by road, through the mess a major accident causes, that is no joke. Imagine getting out of Kenton and up the M1 to Junction 6 in rush hour, in snow. Even with blues and twos, that's scary.

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emmaella says...
2:17am Tue 29 Jan 13

last year my dad suffered a heart attack he and us waited 30 mins plus we honestly believe few more minutes he would have died and we were told that from a very senior paramedic ambulance people begged for us to complain and told us the ambulance service is in a mess people will die waiting one even turned up in what can only be described as a van!

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OAC Bailiff says...
7:32am Tue 29 Jan 13

i called ambulance last year for my son they said someone will call me back but didnt after an hour of keep phoning i lost my ragg with them shouting then they finaly sent one i said if it wasnt an emergency i wouldnt be calling 999 4 phone calls it took before they sent one please people try hard not to become ill

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MarsLander says...
9:04am Tue 29 Jan 13

Vicar*o*rage wrote:
It is so typical of Dopey Dave Scameron and the Tory Conning Govt to rip of those in need and allow Big Business and wealthy to evade paying their due taxes, The poor, sick, disable suffer because of this Government
It was the same under Labour.

We need to get rid of managers that try to fiddle the stats and get managers that try to offer a service.

If the stats say your group missed all their targets then you either need to try harder or you need more help, more resources/staff etc.

If the stats say you hit all your targets and you really didn't, just fiddled the stats, then you are helping no-one and deserve sacking.

Paying bonuses is a big part of the problem. Without bonuses people used to be more honest about their teams performance.

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TRT says...
10:17am Tue 29 Jan 13

And when the local A&E gets cut off by traffic jams and the ambulances are having to cover Hemel, St Albans and Watford...?

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garston tony says...
10:52am Tue 29 Jan 13

The cracks are starting to appear, but I wonder if as is the norm the management who are tasked with making cut backs look at the front line instead of their own ranks? From what I hear there are plenty of chiefs looking after ever decreasing numbers of Indians

And doesnt it cost more in the long run to use a private ambulance service anyway?

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Roy Stockdill says...
1:28pm Tue 29 Jan 13

You're right about the chiefs and Indians, Tony - but doesn't the NHS overall suffer from this as well? Far too many pin-striped managers shuffling paper around and too few doctors, nurses and other proper medical staff.

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LSC says...
2:38pm Tue 29 Jan 13

Roy Stockdill wrote:
You're right about the chiefs and Indians, Tony - but doesn't the NHS overall suffer from this as well? Far too many pin-striped managers shuffling paper around and too few doctors, nurses and other proper medical staff.
I remember the excellent episode of 'Yes, Minister' with the hospital with no patients, nurses or doctors, but 400 'essential' admin staff.
They were very pleased to win the 'Cleanest Hospital in the District Award'

Sad how true to life that programme appears. I remember Thatcher famously saying she watched it and thought it was a documentary.

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garston tony says...
3:12pm Tue 29 Jan 13

Sorry LSC, I meant that as a dig at the NHS as a whole not just the ambulance service.

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OAC Bailiff says...
3:22pm Tue 29 Jan 13

fire police and ambulance should all be made redundant from cut backs bloody disgrace

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Roy Stockdill says...
3:27pm Tue 29 Jan 13

I don't know about ambulance staff, but it's well known that because of the way their shift systems work lots of police officers and firemen moonlight at second jobs.

Shouldn't the powers-that-be be addressing this scandal and organising the emergency services from efficiently?

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Roy Stockdill says...
3:28pm Tue 29 Jan 13

Sorry, I meant more efficiently!

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stuegs says...
3:51pm Tue 29 Jan 13

Not sure what you re getting at Roy about fireman and police moonlighting??
They moonlight, as you put it, because
they have to. Their wages are not enough to support families and pay mortgages.

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Uneek says...
4:42pm Tue 29 Jan 13

What people do in their own time is up to them and has no baring on the shortfalls of Police,Fire or Ambulance Services.

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Roy Stockdill says...
4:57pm Tue 29 Jan 13

>They moonlight, as you put it, because
they have to. Their wages are not enough to support families and pay mortgages.<

I'm not convinced of that at all. I would be very surprised if police officers and firemen don't earn more than the average national wage. It also seems to me that especially in the case of police officers, moonlighting in second jobs could compromise their legal status as police officers and possibly make them subject to threats and blackmail or the danger of "doing favours" for those they meet in the course of doing a second job.

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stuegs says...
6:12pm Tue 29 Jan 13

Load of rubbish Roy. You can say that about almost any profession. People dont moan if an office worker gets an evening or weekend job in a bar, for example.

If a police officer is prepared to make choices like that, that may compromise their profession, they dont need a second job to do that!! So are you going to stop policemen drinking in pubs when theyre off duty?? In case someone approaches them and puts them in a 'compromising position' or threatens or blackmails them????

Silly thing to say really Roy

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garston tony says...
12:01pm Wed 30 Jan 13

Roy if it doesn’t affect their job as a policeman or fireman why not allow them to have second jobs?

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