Britain’s busiest NHS ambulance service may no longer be able to answer all 999 calls quickly enough because its control rooms are chronically short of call handlers, it has warned.
The London ambulance service (LAS) disclosed this week that its capacity to respond to medical emergencies has been under threat because of a 20% shortfall in its control room staff.
Campaigners for patients have voiced alarm over the findings, saying the risk to the service could lead to people dying of strokes or heart attacks because an ambulance has taken longer than it should to reach them.
In a report presented to its board on Tuesday the LAS identified an acute lack of staff at its two main bases as a key risk to its ability to function. Listing the risks faced by the trust, it said: “The trust may be unable to maintain service levels due to insufficient staff in the emergency operations centre (EOC).”
The Patients Association said the LAS’s inability to recruit enough staff posed a direct threat to patients.
“The London ambulance service appears to be saying that it is likely that it will be unable to respond properly to medical emergencies due to a lack of staff. This is hugely worrying, but also the logical end point of underfunding the NHS over a sustained period,” said Rachel Power, its chief executive.
“The consequences for someone having a stroke or heart attack, for example, don’t bear thinking about. Lives are being put at risk as a direct result of political choices.”
A separate report to the LAS board noted that a call-handling action plan and a recruitment and retention plan with a focus on the EOC were now in place, and that vacancies within the EOC were currently running at 20% of the agreed establishment, compared with a national average of 15%.
Article from The Guardian, 2 March 2018