The Welsh Ambulance Service has asked us to publicise this message:
Since 1974 your ambulance service has been measured by the time it takes to reach emergency calls. A lot has changed since then, but the way we are measured has not.
Today, your ambulance service provides much more sophisticated clinical care, yet the focus has still been on how many ambulances arrive at calls within eight minutes regardless of the clinical outcome.
So, from 1 October 2015 for a one-year trial period, we moved away from time-based targets to more quality focused patient outcomes that are based on what we do for you once we arrive.
People with an immediate life-threatening condition – such as a cardiac arrest, will continue to receive an immediate response but for less serious conditions, we’re going to be measured on how well we treat you and how often we manage to avoid a trip to hospital by referring you to the most appropriate clinical setting.
You can read more about the new model by visiting the Welsh Ambulance Service website at www.ambulance.wales.nhs.uk/ and on twitter @WelshAmbulance
