Ambulance crews
Our staff working on the emergency ambulances are either paramedics, advanced technicians or emergency care support workers. They respond to a wide variety of calls but mainly to serious or life-threatening calls.

Paramedics and advanced technicians are trained to deal with life-threatening illnesses and injuries. In addition, paramedics are further trained to carry out invasive procedures which they may need to perform during the most serious medical emergencies. These procedures include intubation (where a tube is entered into the windpipe to help a patient breathe); cannulation (where a thin tube is inserted into a vein to introduce fluids or drugs as fast as possible) and needle chest decompressions (inserting a needle into the chest to release the build up of air pressure in the lungs).
We carry a full range of equipment on our emergency ambulances, including electrocardiogram (ECG) machines to monitor a patient's heart and defibrillators which can restart the heart if a patient goes in to cardiac arrest.