Search the hub
Showing results for tags 'Ambulance'.
Found 321 results
-
Content ArticleChristina Ruse was admitted to the Spire Hospital on 14 December 2021 and underwent a total left hip replacement. Her condition deteriorated and observations were commenced at five minute intervals. Mrs Ruse was reviewed and on further deterioration in her condition it was decided to transfer her to the High Dependency Unit, Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital. On arrival of the ambulance Mrs Ruse was undergoing a further investigatory procedure. On this being completed Mrs Ruse was taken to the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital, where her condition continued to deteriorate and she died on 15 December 2021.
-
Content ArticleBarbara Hollis underwent a total left knee replacement operation on 22 February 2022. The surgery was uneventful with no complications, however after her return to the ward Mrs Hollis became restless and confused. Following a review of her deteriorating condition the decision was made to transfer her to the High Dependency Unit at the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital. Arrangements were made for the transfer and the ambulance service was called at 19.51 and were told that immediate clinical intervention was needed, but the agreed hospital to hospital transfer pathway was not followed. There was a two hour delay in ambulance attendance, during which time Mrs Hollis continued to deteriorate. Mrs Hollis was subsequently taken to the High Dependency Unit at the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital where her condition continued to deteriorate and she died in the early hours of the 23 February 2022.
-
News Article
Welsh Ambulance Service declares extraordinary incident due to delays
Patient_Safety_Learning posted a news article in News
An ambulance spent 28 hours outside a hospital after an "extraordinary incident" was declared due to delays. The Welsh Ambulance Service said 16 ambulances had waited outside the emergency department at Morriston Hospital, Swansea, at one time. It said multiple sites across Wales were affected. The extraordinary incident, which asked people to only call 990 if their emergency was "life or limb threatening", is now over. Read full story Source: BBC News, 23 October 2023 -
News Article
Welsh Ambulance Service declares extraordinary incident due to delays
Patient-Safety-Learning posted a news article in News
An ambulance spent 28 hours outside a hospital after an "extraordinary incident" was declared due to delays. The Welsh Ambulance Service said 16 ambulances had waited outside the emergency department at Morriston Hospital, Swansea, at one time. It said multiple sites across Wales were affected, "specifically" in the Swansea Bay health board area. Lee Brooks, director of operations, told BBC Radio Wales Breakfast the situation was "heart-breaking". The service said people should only call 999 if their emergency was "life or limb threatening". Judith Bryce, assistant director of operations at the Welsh Ambulance Service, said on Sunday the service was experiencing "patient handover delays outside of emergency departments. This is taking its toll on our ability to respond within the community." Read full story Source: BBC News, 23 October 2023 -
Content Article
CQC: State of Care 2022/23
Patient Safety Learning posted an article in Care Quality Commission (CQC)
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) State of Care is an annual assessment of health care and social care in England. The report looks at the trends, shares examples of good and outstanding care, and highlights where care needs to improve. -
News Article
Patient declared dead woke up in hospital
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
An ambulance trust has apologised after a patient who was declared "dead" later woke up in hospital. As first reported by The Northern Echo, the individual was taken by paramedics to Darlington Memorial Hospital on Friday. The newspaper reported they had been declared dead following an incident earlier that day. The North East Ambulance Service (NEAS) apologised to the patient's family and said an inquiry had begun. The patient has not been identified or their current condition revealed. NEAS director of paramedicine Andrew Hodge said: "As soon as we were made aware of this incident, we opened an investigation and contacted the patient's family. "We are deeply sorry for the distress that this has caused them. "A full review of this incident is being undertaken and we are unable to comment any further at this stage. "The colleagues involved are being supported appropriately and we will not be commenting further about any individuals at this point." Read full story Source: BBC News, 17 October 2023 -
Content ArticleThe Association of Ambulance Chief Executives (AACE) and the Office of the Chief Allied Health Professions Officer (CAHPO) have launched three publications aimed at reducing misogyny and improving sexual safety in the ambulance service.
-
News Article
Ambulance sector vows to improve sexual safety
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
The ambulance sector has signed up to a consensus statement in a bid to tackle misogyny and improve sexual safety for its staff and patients. The statement – which chief allied health professions officer for England Suzanne Rastrick launched at this week’s Ambulance Leadership Forum – commits the service to a “cultural transformation”. Several ambulance trusts have been criticised for a culture which includes “highly sexualised banter” in recent years, with reports highlighting sexual harassment, often of younger female staff. The statement’s guiding principles include: a focus on protecting staff from misogyny and inappropriate sexual behaviour; removing barriers to speaking up and supporting those affected; and working towards an inclusive culture where staff understand misogyny and come to work feeling “sexually safe”. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 5 October 2023 -
News ArticleA coroner has warned that a private hospital is relying on NHS ambulances to transport patients despite “being fully aware” of the pressures on the ambulance service and resulting delays. The warning came at the end of an inquest into a patient who died after a 14-hour wait for an ambulance to transfer him from the private Spire hospital in Norwich to the NHS-run Norfolk and Norwich university hospital a few minutes’ drive away. The last two years have seen a succession of inquests relating to ambulance delays. But in the latest case Jacqueline Lake, senior coroner for Norfolk, expressed concerns over Spire hospital’s use of NHS ambulances when complications and emergencies mean its patients need NHS care. “Spire Norwich hospital does not deal with multi-disciplinary and emergency treatment at its hospital and transfers patients requiring such treatment to local acute trusts, usually the Norfolk and Norwich university hospital,” Lake wrote in a prevention of future deaths (PFD) report. “Spire Norwich hospital continues to rely on EEAST [East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust] to transport such patients to the acute hospital, being fully aware of the demands placed on the EEAST generally and the delays which occur as a result.” Research suggests that nearly 600 patients were urgently transferred from private healthcare to NHS emergency care in the year to June 2021 across the UK – around one in a thousand private healthcare patients. But previous analysis by the Centre for Health and the Public Interest (CHPI) thinktank found that some private hospitals were transferring more than one in every 250 of their inpatients to NHS hospitals. ‘“Transferring unwell patients from a private hospital to an NHS hospital is a known patient safety risk which all patients treated in the private sector face – including the increased numbers of NHS patients who are now being treated in private hospitals because of government policy,” said David Rowland, director of the CHPI. “And despite numerous tragedies and despite the fact that politicians and regulators are fully aware of this risk, nothing has been done to address it.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 23 September 2023
-
Content ArticleOn 3 August 2022, Geoffrey Hoad underwent a total hip replacement at The Spire Hospital. On 5 August 2022, Mr Hoad was diagnosed with a paralytic ileus and some respiratory compromise with gradually deteriorating renal function. On 6 August 2022, Mr Hoad’s transfer to Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital was agreed due to possible bowel obstruction, possible pulmonary infection and deteriorating renal function. Ambulance service was called at 18:16 hours and again at 23.45. On 7 August 2022, the ambulance service was called again at 07.38 hours. The ambulance was on scene at 08:26 hours. The medical cause of death was: 1a) Sub Acute Myocardial Infarction 1b) Coronary Artery Atherosclerosis 2) Hospital Admission for Post Operative lieus.
-
News Article
A&E handover delays ‘still getting worse at some hospitals’
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Ambulance chiefs say handover delays have got worse at some trusts in recent months, despite the picture improving nationally since last winter. A report from the Association of Ambulance Chief Executives says there are continuing concerns about handover delays at emergency departments. Jason Killens, the body’s lead chief executive for operations, told HSJ: “There’s been some improvement [at some sites] since February, but what we’ve also seen is a commensurate or bigger decay in other sites across that same period.” Mr Killens said “it’s difficult to be precise” about why some trusts have struggled more than others but that challenged hospitals are often affected by “pathway issues” including delayed discharges. “And then maybe there are challenges around stable leadership or the visibility of the leadership, the culture there about managing that risk dynamically, and so on,” he added. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 14 September 2023 -
Content ArticleThe Association of Ambulance Chief Executives (AACE) has published a new report charting the major increase in the frequency and length of hospital handover delays over the past ten years, calling for an even greater focus on improvements that will reduce and eradicate delays, prevent more patients from coming to significant harm and stop the drain on vital ambulance resources.
-
Content ArticleFour enablers of effective collaboration between integrated care systems and ambulance services.
-
Content ArticleDelays in the handover of patient care from ambulance crews to emergency departments (EDs) are causing harm to patients. A patient’s health may deteriorate while they are waiting to be seen by ED staff, or they may be harmed because they are not able to access timely and appropriate treatment. This national investigation sought to examine the systems that are in place to manage the flow of patients through and out of hospitals and consider the interactions between the health and social care systems (the ‘whole system’). This report brings together the findings from the investigation’s three interim reports and provides an update since they were published. You can view the interim reports on the hub: Interim report 1 (16 June 2022) Interim report 2 (3 November 2022) Interim report 3 (27 February 2023)
-
News Article
Nearly 7,000 ambulance workers in England left in past year, figures show
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Ambulance services in England have experienced a mass exodus of staff in the past year with nearly 7,000 leaving their jobs, figures have revealed. The number of emergency service crew leavers has risen sharply compared with 2019 levels, prompting concern for patient safety during the next NHS winter crisis. The government has been called on to launch an urgent recruitment drive before winter to cover the 2,954 vacancies across all ambulance services in England. Daisy Cooper, Liberal Democrats' health and social care spokesperson, said: “With patients struggling to see a GP at the front door of the NHS and unable to access social care at the back door of the NHS, ambulance crews are unfairly caught between a rock and a hard place, picking up the slack from a health and care system that is broken at both ends. “Patients who struggle to access the care they need, when they need it, are then left waiting for emergency assistance in pain and distress for an ambulance. The shortage of NHS staff has caused untold pain for millions of people across the country, especially those left to wait for hours in pain for an ambulance to arrive. “The government must begin an urgent recruitment drive before winter begins and our ambulance services are yet again put under unsustainable strain. There is no time to waste.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 22 August 2023 -
News Article
‘Great’ trust seen as ‘insular and dismissive of integration’
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
A “great” ambulance trust’s “uncompromising” focus on outcomes and its own performance has been a barrier to system working and affected relationships with partners, an external review has advised it. The report from the Good Governance Institute on West Midlands Ambulance Service University Foundation Trust found partners felt it was “increasingly out of sync with new ways of working under integrated care” and even “somewhat dismissive of the integrated care agenda”. It praised the trust overall, saying: “WMAS is seen by all those we spoke to as being a great organisation: well run, with strong leadership and a clear focus on operational delivery. But it said communications, especially through the press, were seen as “bullish and at times damaging to the reputation of partners and harmful to patients”. Its reputation and performance can create a culture of engagement with external partners that “seems defensive at best and arrogant/dismissive at worst”, with the trust being “prickly towards external challenge”, the consultants’ report added. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 27 July -
Content ArticleA casually centred proposal identifying how Fire and Rescue Services can improve pre-hospital care and quality of life outcomes for burn survivors. David Wales and Kristina Stiles have released this report looking at the burn survivor experience in the pre-hospital environment. The work makes ten operational recommendations and also two 'lessons learned' recommendations exploring strategic partnership working and the resulting fragmented services.
-
News ArticleA scheme in which ‘category 2’ 999 calls are validated by clinicians will be extended nationally after reducing journeys by 4%in a pilot, with no adverse incidents, NHS England has told HSJ. NHSE also confirmed that one ambulance trust in the scheme, the West Midlands, has begun delaying the dispatch of ambulances for some category 2 calls by up to 23 minutes so that the validation can take place. At three other trusts – London, South Western and the East Midlands – about 40% of category 2 calls receive clinical validation, but an ambulance is dispatched to them as soon it is available, as normal. Officials said they believe the demand benefit could be greater if ambulance trusts are able to devote more clinical capacity to the validation process. About 40% of category 2 calls are judged suitable for validation, but not all of them complete the process before an ambulance arrives. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 11 July 2023
-
Content ArticleNHS England commissioned a limited scope independent review into patient safety concerns and governance processes related to the North East Ambulance Service. Chaired by Dame Marianne Griffiths DBE, the review considered the facts surrounding a number of individual cases, reviewed the processes surrounding coronial investigations and reviewed the seven previous investigations and reviews undertaken by the ambulance service to determine if they were sufficient to fully understand and resolve issues.
-
News Article
Ambulance service apologises to families
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
An ambulance service has apologised to families following a review into claims it covered up errors by paramedics and withheld evidence from coroners. The families of a teenager and a 62-year-old man were not told paramedics' responses were being investigated by North East Ambulance Service (NEAS). The deaths, in 2018 and 2019, were raised by a whistleblower last year. Among the findings of the independent review carried out by Dame Marianne Griffiths, were inaccuracies in information provided to the coroner, employees who were "fearful of speaking up" and "poor behaviour by senior staff". The study, commissioned by the former health secretary Sajid Javid in August, examined four of the five cases that were highlighted by the whistleblower, initially in The Sunday Times. It found two bereaved families were left in the dark about investigations into the response of paramedics called to help their loved ones. Read full story Source: BBC News, 12 July 2023 -
News Article
‘Beginnings of safety culture’ emerging at ‘cover-up’ trust
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
An ambulance trust at the centre of an inquiry into alleged cover-ups has shown signs of improvement, according to the Care Quality Commission (CQC). North East Ambulance Service Foundation Trust has been accused of withholding information from coroners. An ongoing inquiry chaired by former acute trust chief executive Dame Marianne Griffiths is looking at how it deals with serious incidents, whistleblowers’ concerns and whether the trust complies with the “duty of candour” as well as its processes around inquests. The CQC report suggests it has made progress on many of these areas since inspections last year – which triggered a warning notice – and has raised the rating for its emergency and urgent care division from “inadequate” to “requires improvement”. The inspectors said it was a “mixed picture” but they had seen “the beginnings of a safety culture emerging within the trust”. Read full story Source: HSJ, 7 July 2023 -
News Article
West Midlands Ambulance Service mistakes caused serious incidents
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
More than half of all serious incidents where patients came to harm involving West Midlands Ambulance Service were due to clinical errors. A trust audit found choking management, cardiac arrests and inappropriate patient discharges as themes. It also noted a decision to close all community ambulance stations was taken without first doing a full risk assessment of the impact on safety. After the number of serious incidents increased from 138 in 2021-22 to 327 in 2022-23, an audit by WMAS found 53% were due to mistakes with their treatment. A situation where a person comes to significant harm in care is identified as a serious clinical incident. Sources say the trust also delayed looking into 5,000 serious patient incidents. Read full story Source: BBC News, 29 June 2023 -
News Article
Report finds West Midlands ambulance whistleblowers stifled
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Ambulance staff in the West Midlands have had their ability to speak up as whistleblowers stifled for many years, an independent inquiry has found. The investigation, commissioned by NHS England, also identified failings in financial governance at West Midlands Ambulance Service (WMAS). Five senior and former members of staff spoke out to NHS England. WMAS accepts it has learning to do, but says the report expresses confidence in the service's ability to address the issues raised. The whistleblowers included a finance director, medical, operations and quality control staff. They raised issues through the Freedom to Speak Up scheme with the National NHS England Team. The inquiry, led by Carole Taylor Brown, had terms of reference which included "Governance, probity, the difficulty of speaking up about these issues and the alleged behaviour of some senior leaders". Read full story Source: BBC News, 28 June 2023 -
News Article
New triage policy implicated in 44-year-old’s death
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
An ambulance service says it has sped up clinical review of lower-priority calls, after a coroner said the new triage process — introduced in response to recent waiting time pressures — ‘will lead to further deaths’. The coroner raised concerns with West Midlands Ambulance Service after a type 1 diabetic patient died following a long delay in deciding whether to send an ambulance. Following a pilot in July 2021, all category 3 and 4 incidents at WMAS, except for a predefined list of exceptions, are sent directly to the trust’s “clinical validation team” to triage patients, with the aim of reducing the need for ambulance call-outs. It is thought a similar approach has been introduced across England since covid, as there have been huge pressures on ambulance capacity. But coroner Emma Serrano has raised concerns about the process in a prevention of future deaths report published this week. The inquest was told that Ms Finch waited 10 hours for her call to be “clinically assessed” and an ambulance call-out approved as the validation team was “under-staffed”. The PFD report also said that there was “no time limit” for assessments to take place, and no prioritisation system. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 14 June 2023 -
Content ArticleOn the 9 October 2021 an investigation was carried out into the death of Ms Sandra Diane Finch, a 44 year old woman who had a history of Type 1 diabetes mellitus. The investigation concluded at the end of the inquest on 3 May 2023. The conclusion of the inquest was a narrative conclusion of ketoacidosis due to insulin depravation contributed to by neglect. The cause of death was: 1a) Ketoacidosis 1b) Uncontrolled Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus 1c) Insulin depravation.
