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Anyone who has seen 24 Hours in A&E knows the sound of that red telephone. The loud ring, preceding a patient’s arrival. I remember exactly where I was when I first heard it, and I knew it was the start of something brilliant.
Indeed, late on a summer’s night in 2010 I found myself in an emergency department in South London.
My business partner Nick Curwin and I were at King’s College Hospital, Camberwell, to observe what it was like in Resus, the resuscitation area of the Accident & Emergency department where they treat those with the most life-threatening conditions.
I wasn’t really sure what to expect and had imagined making a brief visit to get the lie of the land. But then the red phone rang. Booming, insistent.
It was hastily picked up by one of the emergency staff who then announced over the tannoy that a motorcyclist was being rushed in by ambulance from a nearby road traffic accident.
The minutes that followed were calm but intense. Preparation. The anticipation was palpable.
When the double doors flew open and a young man was wheeled in, he didn’t look in a good way.
Would he make it? And if he did, would he walk again?
Hooked
We sat for hours in rapt silence as the extraordinary medical team worked to save him. He was going to be OK.
It was that drama, that touch and go moment – and we knew an audience would be hooked too.
We were right.
Ten years, two hospitals ( filming has been at St George’s, South London, since 2014) and over 250 episodes later, the series is as fascinating as ever.
We have witnessed incredible life and death situations with some miraculous recoveries. Who could forget Sam, the 19-year-old motorcyclist flown from the south coast by air ambulance. Found bent double under a bus, he took his first steps at the end of the episode.
Then there was Corey, the 24-yearold ice hockey player who suffered a cardiac arrest in front of his wife of seven days. It took 25 minutes of CPR before paramedics were able to restart his heart. In hospital it was touch and go before he was diagnosed with a rare syndrome and had a device fitted that would keep him alive.
Among all this, it’s the people who make the programme.
Yes, while there had been plenty of A&E-based documentaries before, none had given the audience the same sense of unfolding drama.
When we pitched the idea, we knew it sounded ludicrous – to install close to 100 remotely operated cameras on the walls of an emergency department in order to tell the stories of those patients treate surpri Hospi
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We have seen incredible life and death situations and amazing recoveries