To consider the report of the scrutiny review of the West Midlands Ambulance Service in Herefordshire.

The Committee considered the report of the scrutiny review of the West Midlands Ambulance Service in Herefordshire, commissioned by the Committee in September 2008.

The Chairman thanked the Review Group for their work and the balanced report they had produced. She also thanked the officers of the Ambulance Trust in particular for the open way in which they had responded to requests for information, together with officers of the Primary Care Trust and the Hospitals Trust.  She also thanked officers of the Council who had supported the review.

The Chairman of the Review Group was invited to comment on the Review Group’s findings.  He endorsed the Chairman of the Committee’s thanks to those who had contributed to and supported the review.   He then commented on the Group’s principal findings and recommendations as set out in the executive summary of the report.

Other Members of the Review Group commented on and highlighted some of the findings they considered to be of particular concern.

In the ensuing discussion the following principal points were made:

·         In response to a question about what happened if one of the vehicles from Herefordshire had to travel to Birmingham a representative of the Ambulance Trust confirmed that as soon as the vehicle had completed that one job it was returned to the locality and not retained for assignment to other calls in the Birmingham area.

·         Turnaround times at the hospital were a particular concern identified in the Review report.  The Ambulance Trust Locality Manager commented that, whilst there were improvements to be made, Hereford Hospital’s performance in this respect compared favourably with other hospitals.  One of the main problems faced in Herefordshire was the fact that there was only the one acute hospital so if a difficulty arose at that hospital there was no convenient alternative facility to which patients could be taken.

·         The resilience of the ambulance service in the county and the importance of regular needs assessments to ensure that the service was resilient was discussed.  It was noted that the review recommended additional resource be provided at Ledbury.

·         The recommendation that there should be improvement in collaboration and co-location of blue light services was discussed, noting that the national development of a shared radio system would represent one step forward.

·         The importance of examining patient outcomes rather than relying simply on the measurement of time-based targets was discussed. It was noted that a national consultation exercise on targets was underway and it was to be hoped that this would address this concern.

·         The Chief Executive of the Hospitals Trust commented that bed capacity clearly had a bearing on turnaround times.  However, the Trust had already made improvements in turnaround times and he would confirm progress in his formal response to the Review. 

·         The Review Group had been informed in February that the commissioners of the ambulance service had proposed their own independent review of the service in December 2008, the Committee’s own review having been commissioned in September 2008.  Assurance was sought and received that this later review, which it was noted was now due to report to the regional commissioners in May 2009, would take account of the Committee’s recommendations.  The Committee was advised that from Herefordshire PCT’s perspective this later review had been prompted amongst other things by concerns about the unit cost of the service and recognition that the needs analysis for Herefordshire needed to be updated.

The Chairman commented, in conclusion, that the review of the Ambulance Service had been undertaken in response to concerns expressed by members of the public. The review had found a service that was generally performing well but had also found there had been some grounds for that publicly expressed concern and the consequent need for improvement in some aspects of the service.

RESOLVED:

That (a)  the findings of the review of West Midlands Ambulance service in Herefordshire be approved unanimously for submission to relevant Health Service bodies;

(b)   the response to the Review be reported to the first available meeting of the Committee; and

(c)   a further report on progress in response to the Review then be made after six months with consideration then being given to the need for any further reports to be made.