Sunday the 5th of July 2020 is the 72nd anniversary celebrating the creation of the National Health Service (NHS).
The NHS was founded on the principles that it meet the needs of everyone, be free at the point of delivery, and be based on clinical need - not ability to pay.
This model photoshoot is therefore a small tribute to 72 years of the NHS, and the incredible care given by its staff.
Depicted here are a selection of 1/76 scale (OO Gauge) Ambulance vehicles of the Scottish Ambulance Service (SAS)
Pictured is an Oxford Diecast, Mercedes Sprinter standard A&E Unit, Code 3 Ford Transit Urgent Tier resource, and Code 3 Paramedic Response Unit.
The Scottish Ambulance Service is a special NHS Health Board, more specifically under NHS Scotland. It is made up of a number of different service aspects which include;
A&E Service -
Staffed primarily by Paramedic, Ambulance Technician and emergency response driving trained Ambulance Care Assistant staff. A&E crews respond to 999 calls from the public, in addition to assistance requests from the other 999 services, General Practice and Hospital staff, Community Alarm companies and others.
The A&E service itself has a further aspect, which is the Urgent Tier (U/T) service. Whereas traditional A&E vehicles are staffed by either two Paramedics, two Technicians, or a combination of the two, the Urgent Tier service is traditionally staffed by a blue light trained ACA, with the Technician providing clinical care. U/T resources respond to calls from community practice staff who require patients to be admitted to hospital but who do not require an emergency response. Such calls are generally requested within a 1 to 4 hour timeframe. U/T may also be sent to inter-hospital transfer calls based on the same time requests.
Because the U/T vehicles carry the same emergency equipment such as manual defibrillator, suction, airway adjuncts, oxygen etc and have a clinically trained Technician on board, they can also be used to respond to “Red” calls (Immediately Life Threatening) where they will be backed up by a further A&E crew who would then convey the patient.
Paramedic Response Units (PRU) are the other main aspect of the standard A&E service. These are single crewed Paramedics in cars or on motorbikes. They are sent to calls as a first response, on request to assist double Technician crews, or to certain calls which require emergency intervention but may not require hospital attendance (known epileptic seizures, diabetic hypoglycaemia).
Community First Responders -
These are volunteers who have been trained by the service to respond to certain categories of emergency calls and who are equipped with Automated External Defibrillators (AED) and oxygen. They are especially useful in rural areas where they are likely to arrive before an Ambulance, and can be vital in the chain of survival. Some groups have marked vehicles, however they are not blue light authorised and cannot claim any exemptions while responding.
Air Ambulance -
The Scottish Ambulance Service is the only UK service with its own fully funded Air Ambulances. These include two fixed wing aircraft and two helicopters. These are additionally supplemented by a further two helicopters of the Scottish Charity Air Ambulance, which are staffed by SAS Paramedics.
The Air service is a combination of emergency and non-emergency, with both helicopters and fixed wing aircraft transferring emergency patients to mainland hospitals for ongoing care, in addition to providing longer distance transfers for island communities outpatients to mainland clinics and hospitals for appointments.
Patient Transport Service -
This is the non-emergency aspect of the service, however is still incredibly busy. Staffed by Ambulance Care Assistants (ACA), these staff drive minibus derived ambulances, people carriers and cars. They are used for transporting patients to outpatient clinics, for regular dialysis treatment and for hospital discharge transport. There are strict requirements for those utilising the service due to how busy it is, and those requesting must have a clinical need such as disability or frailty which requires the assistance of the ACA’s.
Special Operations Response Team (SORT) -
A mixture of different clinical grades, including ACA staff, SORT are specially trained to respond to a variety of incidents such as Hazardous situations, chemical or biological situations, firearms etc. There are a number of teams strategically spread out across the country. Equivalent services elsewhere may use the term “HART” (Hazardous Area Response Team).
Ambulance Control Centre -
Based at centres in Glasgow, Queensferry and Inverness, ACC staff are split between A&E and PTS.
A&E call handlers are those you are passed to after telling the BT operator you require the Ambulance Service. They are ask questions to identify the location and the situation, before asking further questions using a triaging system to grade calls. Upon doing so, they can then provide emergency instructions on a variety of situations, such as talking callers through CPR, childbirth, use of Epi-pens and more.
Upon logging by the Call Handler, the Dispatcher is then responsible for allocating the call to the nearest available resource and passing the relevant information to the Ambulance Mobile Data Terminal, or by Airwave radio. Dispatchers are also responsible for crew welfare and safety, ensuring they are given their rest periods etc.
ACC Cardonald in Glasgow additionally is home to the Special Services Desk who co-ordinate the Air Ambulance services, in addition to the specialised ScotStar emergency medical retrieval service and Trauma Teams across the country.
ACC - PTS services are split into call handlers who take and process call requests for PTS transport, and Day Control staff (dispatchers) who maintain contact with PTS crews and update them on changes to their pickups etc.
