Agenda item

To update the committee on the performance and activity of North West Ambulance Service.

Mr Gene Quinn, Interim Head of Service for Cumbria and Lancashire, North West Ambulance Service (NWAS) presented the NWAS performance report to the Committee. He highlighted that the service was not currently meeting the expected standards in regards to wait times for patients and that in order to address this a clinical incidence desk had been established in order to assess need and allocate resources in the most efficient way. The introduction of the desk had already had a positive impact on the response to high category calls.

He advised that there were a number of challenges locally and nationally that were leading to the performance issues such as discharge from hospital into social care and reported that the whole NHS and social care system was working together to address the concerns in order to improve the position. For its part, NWAS was ensuring that only those patients that needed to be admitted and assessed at a hospital were being transported there. If an alternative would better suit the needs of the patient, NWAS was ensuring they were signposted to the right place. He added that levels of staffing had been a concern and that the service was being proactive in recruiting from other countries and newly qualified paramedics.

Members spoke about the potential anxiety in the community in relation to the change of model for the ambulance service noting the hub and spoke sites to be utilised. It was suggested that NWAS consider how best to communicate with residents and concerns in relation to this. In response, Mr Quinn advised he would report back the concerns of the Committee centrally in order to consider how best to communicate the changes to residents. It was expected that the new hub would be open in January 2023 and at this time no open day was being considered.

In response to questions, Mr Quinn advised that it was expected that the new hub model would have a significant positive impact on the workforce, giving them more opportunity to interact with each other and support each other. He noted that being a paramedic was challenging and workers could be witness to terrible incidents. Having a place to come together and talk through experiences was expected to positively impact sickness rates and improve working conditions which would in turn lead to an increase in paramedics in work at any one time.

The Committee focussed on the challenges to the whole system and Mr Quinn advised that all partners including the hospital were focussed on reducing the number of breaches by 50% by March 2023. He added that system leaders had taken a leading role in hospital handovers and that everything possible was being done to address the problems. Mr Matt Cooper, Area Director, Cumbria and Lancashire added that work on clinical pathways was also a key focus such as falls prevention work and the use of the Psynergy vehicle continued, both of which would ensure people could be kept out of hospital when they did not need to be there.

The Committee requested that NWAS returned in 2023 to provide an update on the opening of the new hub, the impact on performance of the measures being introduced and to update on the falls prevention work.