SAVE OUR HOSPITALS: Delay equals death say ambulance crew

I work for the ambulance service. Our work often involves people who call us because all the other doors and avenues have closed or are not available to them. Rightly or wrongly, that is fact.

Unlike most other services we operate 24/7.

We do not have the privilege of 9 to 5 hours, answer phones or calling you back as an option.

These kinds of services do and always will cost money to be dynamic, effective and pioneering with treatment and procedures.

Most, if not all, the packages, support teams and processes put forward will never deter the demand for assistance by emergency services.

We are free and available, two very important words to people who, for whatever reason, are having a crisis.

Most people's perception of ambulance work is when they see us travelling as an emergency response, but we are far more diverse. However, there is a percentage of patients who do require immediate transportation to hospital.

Until we reach the hospital, we are on our own, using all our skills to maintain, treat and stabilise our patients' condition.

Hospital is the only place for these patients.

I need to be able to justify my actions and decisions surrounding all my patient care and I am held accountable for them.

Any avoidable delay would be questioned and yet this is the very area under threat.

Time delay will cost lives

As highlighted in the recent EMJ (Emergency Medical Journal), increases in transportation time lead to more deaths.

Increasing the distances between hospitals results directly in longer response times to patients' calls.

In trauma, wasting valuable minutes of the crucial "golden hour" in transport can only be detrimental to patients.

I have been trained to make clinical decisions out in the field but it is politicians and managers who are deciding my patients' fate.

My skills are in pre-hospital medicine, primarily assessing and transporting patients to hospital.

Our extended roles mean we can sometimes offer definitive treatment on scene but I am not a doctor.

Can these same people making these decisions stand in front of a patient's family and, hand on heart, say: "I'm sorry but despite all our very best attempts we were unsuccessful.

"We are very sorry for your loss".

Try saying that without a lump in your throat.

Our objectives as an ambulance crew are:

To protect

To preserve

To promote recovery of a patient

Allow us to do our job and leave the Accident & Emergency Department alone.

Name and address supplied

PS: This is a personal opinion of mine and not held by the ambulance service, but an opinion many of my colleagues agree with.