REVEALED: CUT-PRICE AMBULANCE CREWS SENT ON 999 CALLS
‘Technicians’ less skilled than paramedics
AMBULANCE bosses are sending cut-price ‘technicians’ to 999 calls instead of paramedics, an investigation reveals today.
They are being dispatched to hundreds of thousands of the most serious emergencies, including heart attacks and seizures. Technicians wear almost the same uniforms as paramedics – meaning most patients are unlikely to notice the difference – but they have less training and fewer skills.
Freedom of Information responses from five of the ten ambulance trusts in England show that they were dispatched to almost 300,000 calls without a paramedic last year.
This included over 155,000 of the most serious ‘ red’ calls, where patients’ lives were deemed to be in immediate danger.
The remaining five ambulance trusts refused to respond. But if the trends are similar for all ten, it suggests that ambulance technicians were sent out
to more than 600,000 calls in total last year.
One whistleblower told the Daily Mail that technicians were now routinely making the same life and death decisions as paramedics.
Julie-Ann Bond, 44, who worked as an ambulance technician for five years, said they were actually sent on more calls than paramedics, and patients had no idea they were any different.
Miss Bond – and other whistleblowers – also said they are now commonly paired with another technician or an even less qualified ‘emergency care assistant’, who has done just three months of training and supervision.
Under-pressure ambulance services across England are struggling to cope with record numbers of 999 calls, on top of a recruitment crisis of paramedics.
In some trusts as many as one in ten paramedic posts are vacant and managers have resorted to recruiting from Australia, Poland and Finland.
Ambulance technicians do three months of classroom training, which also includes remote learning from home.
They must then do 750 hours of work experience in an ambulance or in A&E. This would take five months if they were working full-time, but a year or longer working part-time.
By contrast, paramedics must do a three-year degree followed by a year’s supervised work – passing regular assessments – before they qualify.
It means paramedics have higher skill levels and can insert drips into patients’ veins, set up ECG heart monitors, make diagnoses and insert tubes.
Furthermore, unlike paramedics, technicians do not need to be registered with a professional standards watchdog. This means they cannot be struck off or suspended for life-threaten
‘Could put lives at risk’
ing mistakes. If they are sacked by one ambulance service, there is nothing to stop them going to work elsewhere.
Technicians are also paid less, earning between £18,000 and £22,000 a year compared with paramedics, who start on an average of £ 25,000 but can progress to £35,000 a year.
Former Liberal Democrat health minister Norman Lamb MP said: ‘This is deeply worrying for patients who don’t know or see the difference, but this could put lives at risk.
‘This revelation will send a chill down the spine of many.’
Technicians have been used by ambulance services since the early 2000s and their numbers have been steadily increasing.
The Mail asked the ten ambulance trusts in England for the number of 999 calls responded to by crews of technicians and emergency care assistants – but no paramedic – during 2016/17.
The FoI request also asked how many of these were ‘red’ calls, which are the most serious and include heart attacks, strokes, breathing difficulties and road traffic accidents.
Responses from five of the ten trusts show technicians were sent to at least 295,171 emergency calls in 2016/ 17. This included 155,846 ‘red’ calls.
The five trusts which responded were the East Midlands, the West Midlands, London, the North West and South East Coast ambulance services. They claimed that technicians were adequately trained to deal with the majority of 999 emergencies and many patients did not need a paramedic.
Four of the five trusts said they had hired more technicians in the last five years to cope with the increased demand.
A spokesman for the Association of Ambulance Chief Executives, which represents ambulance bosses, said technicians had a ‘massively positive input’ towards patient care and the NHS as a whole.
A spokesman for NHS England said it was up to individual ambulance services how they managed their resources.
Paramedics could soon have the power to prescribe drugs under NHS plans.
The proposals, made by the Commission on Human Medicines, would cut down on unnecessary hospital and GP visits. The changes are expected to limit the powers to paramedics with extra training.