A report published today by the HSSIB – ‘Healthcare provision in prisons: emergency care response’ – has highlighted how ambulance crews often spend significant resources responding to urgent 999 callouts in prisons that are subsequently cancelled or deemed not a serious enough medical emergency to warrant an ambulance response.
HSSIB’s investigation
examined the emergency response to patients in prison and determined that the volume of 999 calls made is reaching levels which hinder both the prison and emergency services and has a knock-on effect for people in the community, who may be in greater need of an ambulance and are forced to wait longer than necessary for the crew to arrive.
Anna Parry, Managing Director of AACE says:
We very much welcome this HSSIB report and hope its recommendations will create improvements in the way prisons and ambulance services work together to ensure the same standard of health care services for people in prisons and in the community.
Ambulance services and our colleagues in the prison service share the common aim of trying to ensure that the most appropriate healthcare services are always provided within prisons, which is why an ambulance will always be sent when there are serious concerns about the health of a prisoner or staff member.
Improvements in communications and information sharing between prison and ambulance services will help achieve the important recommendations in this HSSIB report. We look forward to working alongside NHS England and our colleagues in the prison service to implement the actions contained within it.
