Ambulances to treat more patients at scene

♦ Half of 999 patients will be treated on the scene instead of being taken to hospital, under NHS plans to save money and reduce pressure on Accident & Emergency departments.

The measures by the country’s biggest ambulance service mean paramedics will use video to assess patients on the spot.

Images will be beamed to doctors, to decide whether a visit to A&E is necessary, or if help could be provided by a GP or community service.

London Ambulance Service (LAS) has set targets to cut the proportion of 999 calls taken to hospital to 53 per cent by 2023. Currently, 63 per cent of cases are ferried to hospital. The plans are intended to save more than £36 million a year.

But health officials said it would also speed up care for those most in need, so that victims of cardiac arrest, heart attacks and strokes could receive a quicker response. Garrett Emmerson, LAS chief executive, said the plans were a “fundamental shift” in the way the ambulance service operated.

“This will improve the speed and quality of the care we provide and reduce pressure on the wider system,” he said. “We know that if we did nothing, pressures on A & E will mount and the strain that the system faces every day will worsen.”

However, Malcolm Alexander, chairman of the LAS Patients’ Forum, told the London Evening Standard: “This is undoubtedly a fine aspiration but it doesn’t seem to be based on reality. If you have an 80-year-old who has fallen but not broken her hip, the idea is that the paramedic will be able to phone up someone who will provide alternative care.

“Without evidence that there is an alternative system available, there are considerable risks to patient safety.”