Plans to scrap Berwick ambulance provoke fury
Ambulance in Berwick
grave concerns have been raised that lives could be put at risk by plans to scrap one of Berwick’s emergency ambulances.
North East Ambulance Service (NEAS) wants to cut the town’s daytime ambulance, leaving it with a single ambulance providing 24-hour cover.
As part of a major overhaul of service delivery, it is also planning to introduce a new tier of Alnwick-based paramedic crews who will manage its urgent care (not life-threatening) workload.
However, the proposals have been branded “completely unacceptable” by Berwick MP Sir Alan Beith and caused uproar at a meeting of Berwick Town Council on Monday night.
Sir Alan said: “I contacted NEAS with the concerns about their proposals to cut ambulance cover in the Berwick area and their reply to me is completely unacceptable. It demonstrates a clear failure to recognise the emergency medical needs of patients in the Berwick area and could put lives at risk.
“There is already heavy reliance on bringing in ambulances from across the Scottish border and from other stations in England when the Berwick crews are tied up in trips to the Wansbeck or Borders Hospitals, which can take two or three hours.
“Leaving Berwick dependent on paramedic crews from a long distance away is below the standard of service which Berwick patients ought to have. I have already raised this with the primary care trust who are responsible for commissioning the service and I hope that people in the Berwick area will back me up by adding their names to the petition to Keep Our Emergency Ambulance.”
Sir Alan has already discussed the crisis with the Primary care Trust and will be meeting NEAS soon to make it clear to them that their proposals are not acceptable to people in and around Berwick.
Councillor Brian Douglas said: “We can’t afford to lose an ambulance out of the system. It’s time to stand up and be counted and shout our cause from the rooftops on this.It’s important the decision makers realise we are not prepared to play second fiddle on this. We want a service appropriate to the people of Berwick.”
Coun Peter Herdman, who is also chairman of the Berwick Hospitals League of Friends, added: “The success of the new emergency hospital, as far as we are concerned, is having adequate ambulance provision, not worse provision.” The council agreed to write a formal letter to NEAS outlining their objection to any withdrawal of ambulance provision and reduction of service.
Rumours of the proposal have been rife around the town for the past two weeks but NEAS would not reveal details until talks with staff began this week.
NEAS chief executive Simon Featherstone said: “We have not reviewed our model of A&E delivery since 2006 and a report of our services highlighted that if we continued to provide ‘more of the same’, there is no doubt that we will fail to meet the response targets across the whole region in the future.”
Berwick currently has a 24-hour ambulance and another that operates 12-hours during the day but the Tweedmouth-based station has the second least used resources to respond to emergencies in the county. On average its crew are operational for 17 per cent of the week on emergency calls and the remaining 83 per cent of their time is occupied by other activities such as the transfer of patients to Wansbeck, Borders, Newcastle or Edinburgh.
“We do not believe this is a satisfactory provision of 999 A&E services,” said Mr Featherstone.
In its review, NEAS has set out to achieve a number of objectives: a paramedic is sent to every 999 patient who needs one; more front line paramedic crewed A&E vehicles are available for life-threatening emergency calls; and a model of delivery that allows it to meet a rising demand and a better service to non-emergency patients.
“As a result, we are proposing to introduce a new tier in our service to manage our urgent care workload that is predominantly carried out by our current paremedic crews,” explained Mr Featherstone.
“Our existing model of delivery clearly does not represent an efficient or productive use of our paramedic resources, including in Berwick.
“This new tier will do almost all of the hospital and GP transfers and around half of the Category C minor cases that come through the 999 system.
“When the Berwick A&E ambulance is transferring an urgent patient to hospital it can be out of the area for two to three hours. In these situations, ambulances from the surrounding area also respond to emergencies in Berwick, if required, and this peripatetic operation will continue.
“We plan for Northumberland overall to have more ambulances, mainly focussed on urgent care patients, under our proposals to free our A&E crews to respond to more life-threatening incident.
“This will mean the ambulance in Berwick will be available to respond to 999 patients more often than it is now; while the transfport needs of urgent care patients where a quick response is not a critical factor of performance will be met by two additional vehicles based in Alnwick to cover the north of the county.”
NEAS aims to implement the proposals by April 2013.
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Weather for Berwick-Upon-Tweed
Thursday 24 May 2012
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Cloudy
Temperature: 10 C to 20 C
Wind Speed: 10 mph
Wind direction: North east
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Temperature: 9 C to 20 C
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Comments
There are 2 comments to this article
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Coldstreamer9
Friday, February 3, 2012 at 10:34 PMIf Scotland becomes independent Berwick won't be able to rely on ambulances from the Borders. This proposal can't be allowed to happen. Berwick deserves better
Coldstreamer9
Friday, February 3, 2012 at 10:31 PMIf Scotland becomes independent Berwick won't be able to rely on ambulances from the Borders. This proposal can't be allowed to happen
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