by Stewart Cowan
http://www.realstreet.co.uk/2014/06/ambulances-without-paramedics-on-some-999-calls-to-save-money
Ambulances without Paramedics on Some 999 Calls to Save Money
Note: A fair point. There is currently no alternative to the NHS, and it will take a generation to replace it with something better for the people, as opposed to better for the usual special interests. This being so, we should insist that the budget is spent on healing the sick. SIG
There is a new money-saving plan now operating where some ambulances are attending 999 calls without a trained paramedic on board.
A few years ago we had the first plastic policemen aka Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs), now we’re getting acrylic ambulance men.
What next? Fibreglass firemen?
Ambulances staffed only by lesser-qualified Emergency Care Assistants (ECAs) will now be responding to incidents in Yorkshire – including the most serious emergencies.
Unions have slammed the move, calling it “deeply concerning”, while ambulance workers said they would not want their relatives being attended by one of the non-paramedic teams.
One staff member, who asked to remain anonymous, said: “I would not want to stand there and watch as the unqualified, untrained, inadequate ambulance response did nothing but watch with me as my relative worsened and possibly died.”
This is a poster on the Yorkshire Conservatives’ blog from about four months before the 2010 general election:
Here is a picture of William Hague unveiling the poster to a gullible nation in the Morley & Outwood constituency.
This is Ed Balls’ constituency. The latest witterings on his website are under the heading, Only Labour can offer the long-term economic plan Britain needs.
No comment from me is required other than that routine would be more suited to the Comedy Store. This person, who has been ‘championing’ sex ‘education’ for five year-olds for years, is obviously seriously deluded (to put it mildly). But that’s beside the point regarding this post. Well, actually, there is a connection. There seems to be a correlation between more detailed sex ‘education’ directed at increasingly younger pupils and increased rates of teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases which cost the NHS (taxpayer).
Back on topic and the issue of ambulances without paramedics on emergency calls has been going on for a while. Here is a story from Suffolk from five months ago:
Medical support staff with as little as six weeks training are responding to thousands of emergency 999 calls instead of qualified paramedics at the East of England Ambulance Service, it can be revealed.
This is because, according to the National Careers Service:
Emergency care assistants are usually on AfC band 3, earning between around £16,271 and £19,268.
Extra allowances to reward out of hours, shift and overtime working.
Meanwhile…
Qualified paramedics start on AfC band 5, earning between £21,388 and £27,901 a year.
Senior paramedics (also known as emergency care practitioners) and team leaders will be on AfC band 6 and can earn up to £34,500 a year.
Additional allowances may be paid to staff in certain parts of the country and to those working on standby or in shift patterns.
Saving all this money can make it possible to add yet another tier of NHS (mis)management!
But while the Department of Health is paying GPs’ surgeries to nanny us to death with such things as schemes and payments to encourage people to stop smoking and while the money is there for procedures which really shouldn’t have to be paid for by the taxpayer, like when Thomas wants to become Thomasina and gets the full physical makeover, the most basic requirements of the ‘health’ service are neglected: paramedics on ambulances and proper hygiene in hospitals.
How many managers are required to make sure there are enough bottles of disinfectant and a sufficient number of cleaners to administer it?
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I have long noticed that when we call an ambulance to the local park it takes ages to arrive (even though the General Hospital, where the ambulances are based, is only three miles away).
Sometimes a little car will arrive first (although still after a long time) and a person will fill in various forms (rather than offer any real help) – till (eventually) the real ambulance arrives.
People often have to take the injured or sick to hospital themselves – waiting for an ambulance will not do any more.
None of this is anything to do with “cuts” – the last government to cut the money going to the NHS was Mr C. back in 1977-8.
The NHS is a state financed system that, naturally, gets more bureaucratic and rule bound over time.
“Take a generation to replace the NHS”.
That does not seem very compassionate – or realistic.
After all, if there is no fundamental reform of the Welfare States (and the fiat money credit bubble which finance them) Western nations (including the United Kingdom) will be de facto bankrupt long before that 30 years or so is up.
However, Sean may be correct in thinking that real reform is politically impossible. At least this side of economic and social breakdown.
While I can’t speak to the training standards, skill sets and protocols of the British system, I did put in a couple years as a volunteer member of a local Emergency Medical Service in Pennsylvania. We operated multiple ambulances licensed as Basic Life Support, meaning that Emergency Medical Technician (120 hours training) was the limit of the care we could provide. First Responder certification (40 hours) was the minimum for a member of the crew, usually the third person and who would do little more thn drive, fetch and carry. Paramedics would respond from another location as needed. We had the highest rate of paramedic assist calls in our county when I was driving and, shortly after I left, our service upgraded to Advanced Life Support licensure with paramedics on all emergency calls.
US ambulance services are licensed by state health departments, but the training and standards are set by the US Department of Transportation
From my experience, I can tell you that there are a great many situations where paramedic skills simply are not needed and to insist on having one or more on board at all times is a waste of manpower. The operative question should be, “will paramedics be available when needed and on a timely basis?” .
I don’t claim to be an expert on what is needed in ambulances. But the generality of my opinion is that the NHS should confine itself to treating the sick – not to joining in the propaganda offensive against our freedoms.