'Ambulance service changes will reduce response times'

The proposals involve replacing permanent standby ambulance crews at rural County Durham locations, such as St John's Chapel, Middleton-in-Teesdale and Barnard Castle, with community paramedics.

People at the meeting, held in St John's Chapel, heard a 15-minute presentation by senior officers of the North-East Ambulance Service NHS Trust (Neas) before asking questions.

Douglas McDougall, out-of- hours development manager for Neas, said: "We are trying to introduce a more skilled paramedic who will treat a patient, then stay in the area while an ambulance transports a patient to hospital."

He said all new paramedics are being trained in using clot-busting heart drugs.

The meeting was told that some of the possible options included moving the ambulance station from St John's Chapel to Stanhope, which would cover a larger population, using retained firefighters to take emergency patients to hospital and pairing community paramedics with advanced drivers.

The chairman of the trust, Tony Dell, said: "We are trying to reduce current response times to life-threatening 999 calls. We are aiming for 75 per cent responses within eight minutes."

There were interruptions from the audience during the meeting, with officers facing a barrage of hostile questions.

One farmer said he liked the idea of a community paramedic, but did not like the idea that if he had another heart attack, it could take an hour-and-a-half for an ambulance to reach him from Bishop Auckland.

A retired woman GP said she was concerned that ambulance staff from outside the area would not know their way around.

"When I broke my hip, the ambulance took two hours to reach me and they had no idea where I was," she said.

Detailed proposals for the changes are expected to be published soon.

This will be followed by public consultation.

FOR

AMBULANCE trusts are trying to modernise to provide a more flexible service to meet the needs of patients.

Against a background of limits to the working hours of doctors and nurses, ambulance services are worried about standby arrangements in rural ambulance stations.

This is particularly applicable in the area covered by the North-East Ambulance Service.

The Neas is concerned that the arrangements in rural stations at Barnard Castle, Middleton-in-Teesdale and St John's Chapel, in Weardale, mean that ambulance crews who have worked a 12-hour daytime shift are called out to answer 999 calls at night.

Neas believes it is safer and more effective to replace the arrangement with a community paramedic.

The paramedics will cover the same area but be mobile and provide 24-hour cover.

Neas said that would improve the ambulance provision, as officers would be fresh and alert.

The paramedic's role will be to answer a 999 call as quickly as possible. A back-up emergency ambulance crew from a local town can then be dispatched to provide support.

AGAINST

OPPONENTS of the Neas proposals fear that lives could be put at risk.

While present arrangements may not be ideal, the opponents argue that it has worked well for many years and, 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it'.

Opponents of the plans acknowledge that it is not ideal to rouse ambulance crew from their sleep, but argue that it is better to have a fully-equipped emergency 999 ambulance based in an outlying rural area, such as Barnard Castle, St John's Chapel or Middleton-in-Teesdale, than rely on a community paramedic who may be working alone in a car or on a motorbike.

The main concern is that a single community paramedic called out to a major incident or a heart attack may not be able to deal with the problem on their own.

Opponents say they would rather have a local ambulance based near the scene of the incident, rather than relying on a back-up ambulance being sent 20 or 30 miles away from the nearest ambulance station.

The opponents also argue that because of a low number of calls at night, the present system has worked well and there is no need to change it.