Friday 19 January 2018

ARE YOU IN SAFE HANDS WITH THE UK AMBULANCE SERVICE?

Nobody will deny that the Ambulance Service in the UK is one of the best in the world. The Service and the 32,000 people who work within it are second to none. In 2016 some 10.7 million emergency calls were handled by English Ambulance Services alone.

·        The job of the Ambulance Service is to respond to 999 or 112 emergency calls, to deal with Doctors urgent hospital admission requests, hospital transfers and to respond to major incidents.

·        That said and like any organization challenges as far as performance do exist.  The challenges centre on under funding resulting in lack of staff, equipment such as vehicles and state of the art satellite tracking equipment and training to up skill medics and other operatives.  Other issues include transfer times in hospitals because of under funding and increasing demand there and in particular in Accident and Emergency departments.

·        Concerns for the Ambulance Service are such that Coroners have written to the service on no less than 86 occasions since July 2013. They warn of the need to make changes because of potentially unnecessary deaths to people in their care.  This excludes people who suffer in different ways and in particular do not arrive at hospitals neurologically intact because of delays, under skilling and lack of equipment because of funding and training issues.

·        The demands on the Ambulance Service are ever increasing partly as a result of our ever increasing ageing population.  The solution is more staff, more equipment, better systems and up skilling by means of better training. This means more money

·        A big well done to everybody who works in the service but more money please.  This is especially so because of the needs of our elderly population and their elderly care issues.

The above is an overview only.

For a free appointment and to find out answers to the questions that need answering  and to get the care you or a loved one need email Andrew Douglas or his  team on ajd@awdrys.co.uk or call on 0800 072 8636. We have offices In Marlborough, Royal Wootton Basset, Devizes & Chippenham. Alternatively visit our website                        www. abdcare.co.uk

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