Response times by NWAS

A report this weekend in the Times said that Ambulance trusts, including NWAS, had been accused of routinely manipulating 999 response times to claim that they had reached life-threatening emergencies in less than 10 seconds.

Almost all ambulance trusts are using an NHS rule allowing them to log response times as near-zero if there was a defibrillator within 200m of a patient and someone nearby trained to use it. The rule applies even if the device was not used or unsuitable for the patient's condition.

About eight years ago, AudlemOnline received five reports of very delayed responses to emergency calls locally, some of over an hour, when the target was eight minutes.

Working with then-Parish Councillor Mike Hill, meetings were held with NWAS senior officials over a period of three years to try and sort out the problem as well as obtaining suitable training for the newly established First Responder Group in Audlem.

The meetings involved Nantwich Town Council too, as Nantwich was having similar slow responses, two MPs (Stephen O'Brien, then Eddisbury MP and Edward Timpson, Crewe & Nantwich's MP.) A difficult TV interview between Stephen O'Brien and NWAS's then chief executive did not do the ambulance service any favours. As it happened, the chief executive retired shortly afterwards.

Eventually, after NWAS initially refusing to accept there was a problem, an Audlem suggestion that an additional ambulance be based in Nantwich 16-hours a day, solved the problem after the suggestion was accepted by the incoming NWAS chief executive, who was far more responsive than his predecessor and the then NWAS senior management team.

Since then, there have been no reports of over-long response times, particularly as the Audlem representatives accepted that a 20-minute target, rather than eight minutes, was realistic for a relatively isolated rural area.

Training also arrived and the First Responder Group has since been a great success.

Given the latest report in the Times newspaper of response time manipulation – and NWAS has recorded 42,763 under 10-second response times according to the newspaper – it may be worth resuming what happened for a year or so after the meetings attended by Mike Hill and AudlemOnline – regular response data for Audlem provided to Audlem Parish Council by NWAS.

This happened for some years, and while there have not been recent reports of serious delays, it may well be worth the Parish Council asking for regular updates which NWAS would surely provide. Given the large number of defibrillators and trained people in Audlem, it would be interesting to see if any under 10-second ambulance response have been recorded locally.

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