paramedics

The NSW Ambulance has introduced mandatory anti-violence training for ALL operational officers. This training involves face-to-face training with an education officer and a 20 minute video to impart skills and knowledge to identify and avoid high-risk situations which may lead to violence.

Health Services Union Hunter ambulance sub-branch president Peter Rumball slammed a 20-minute video being used to train paramedics in the region to cope with and avoid violent situations following another attack against paramedics in Newcastle.

It comes after a paramedic was assaulted in Civic Park on Wednesday night – the ninth attack to occur in the Hunter this year.

Police say the 26-year-old woman was receiving treatment for a laceration above her eye, at about 6pm, when she struck a paramedic in the rib area before fleeing. She will face Newcastle Local Court in June.

Mr Rumball said ‘‘It’s becoming more frequent and we need the ambulance service to step up and provide greater training than a 20-minute video,’’ he said. ‘‘The members have described it as ticking a box and that’s coming directly from the members.’’

Mr Rumball called for paramedics to get training more akin to what police received. ‘‘We need full awareness and more concern of what we’re sending our officers into,’’ he said. ‘‘We’ve got patients who are affected by LSD, ice and PCP. ‘‘We’ve also got people with mental health problems who would normally be in institutions out in the community.’’ This suggestion lacks merit as paramedics are not exposed to the same level of violence as police. Paramedics have the option to “stand off” from locations were violence is occurring or suspected, the police do not.

Mr Rumball also said he was disappointed by the lack of offenders being sent to jail for assaulting paramedics. ‘‘No one will go to jail for assaulting an ambulance officer,’’ he said. ‘‘It is going to take a paramedic to get killed for someone to go to jail. This may be so, but this is his opinion. This is still a matter for the courts and the judicial officers involved. Furthermore, ambulance has demonstrated that they will appeal a sentence that they perceive as being too lenient.

Lewis’ View – Cartoon: Peter Lewis

NSW Ambulance deputy chief executive Mike Willis said they didn’t consider Mr Rumball’s comments as representative of the greater paramedic population. ‘‘This criticism of the video is surprising given that the paramedic unions – HSU and EMSPA – were shown the video and had no issue with it,’’ he said. ‘‘Internally, NSW Ambulance is currently providing anti-violence training for all paramedics. ‘‘The training assists with situational awareness, de-escalating difficult situations, and understanding patterns of behaviour to help a paramedic avert violent situations. ‘‘NSW Ambulance also produced a video to assist paramedics with decision making in circumstances that could become volatile.’’ Mr Willis acknowledged paramedic assaults were increasing. He said criminal charges had been laid in 35 of the 67 alleged assaults that have occurred in the state between January and April this year. ‘‘With the majority still before the NSW courts,’’ he said. ‘‘NSW Ambulance has a zero tolerance policy towards any form of abuse, be it physical or verbal. ‘‘We are committed to ensuring the health and well-being of our entire workforce, with support provided to all of our paramedics.’’

Mr Rumball has a long history of opposing steps taken by ambulance to improve the service to the public, and also to training provided for officers to improve their already difficult and stressful occupation. It is likely that this view is not a true representation of paramedics views. Membership in the HSU has been decimated in Newcastle and indeed throughout the NSW as a result of the corrupt practices demonstrated by HSU senior management. Paramedics have deserted the HSU in droves, some moving to EMSPA, and with many others deserting the union movement all together. This incident would appear to be the Hunter HSU trying to discredit an effective training program provided to combat increasing risk of violence to paramedic officers.

I personally applaud the efforts of ambulance to better prepare officers to manage potentially violent situations that may confront them.

Acknowledgments: The Newcastle Herald; Cartoon: Peter Lewis

A UK coroner lashed out at paramedics who refused to get into a water-filled ditch to help a dying man because of health and safety concerns.

Road accident victim Michael Thornton was lifted on to dry land only when a policeman arrived, by which time it was too late to save him.

At the inquest into the 30-year-old farmer’s death coroner Michael Rose declared: ‘I will not say what I think of health and safety regulations. I was brought up in a country where men risked their lives to save the lives of others.’

Mr Thornton was knocked unconscious when the Land Rover in which he was a passenger crashed on the Somerset Levels and flipped into the 10ft-wide drainage ditch. His two friends managed to haul him on to the side of the upturned vehicle and attempted to revive him. But they were unable to carry him up the slippery banks.

When two male paramedics arrived they made a snap ‘risk assessment’ and refused to get into the water to help. In stark contrast, a policeman who arrived minutes later went straight into the water and pulled Mr Thornton on to the road.

His death is the latest in a series of cases in recent years in which ‘risk assessments’ stopped emergency crews from going to the aid of victims, in some cases costing lives.

Mr Rose, coroner for West Somerset, said: ‘I was brought up in a country where men risked their own lives to save the lives of others. That was a period in our history which has almost ceased. I do praise the actions of PC Day, who dived in, but by that stage it was too late.’

At the inquest in Taunton last week, Mr Rose recorded an accidental death verdict and did not say if Mr Thornton could have been saved if the paramedics had gone in.

The paramedics’ employers insist the crew had to stay dry to provide ‘advanced life support’ such as defibrillation, which could have proved fatal for everyone at the scene if carried out too close to the water.

The inquest heard that Mr Thornton, from East Brent, Somerset, had been drinking with friends Jason Cheal and Matthew Braddick, 27, at a pub in Brent Knoll before the accident last November. Mr Braddick was nearly twice over the alcohol limit as he drove them home just after midnight in his Land Rover Discovery. He crashed into the ditch in Rooksbridge on the Somerset Levels near Weston-super-Mare, claiming later that he had swerved to avoid an animal in the road. Many unlit roads in the area are lined by ditches, or ‘rhynes’, which in winter are often filled with water and can be dangerous to motorists.

Bereft: Michael's father Steve and a woman walk beside the rhyne where their son Michael was fatally injured after the Land Rover he was in crashed

Mr Braddick was later convicted of drink-driving and banned from the road for three years but Mr Rose said he did not think that alcohol was the main cause of the accident. He said they had not been doing over 30mph and may well have swerved to avoid an animal. The ditch depth was not measured but is estimated at 5ft, with knee-deep mud at the bottom. The ambulance response time was not mentioned at the inquest but it was not thought to have been delayed.

‘If the legislation wasn’t quite so stringent then perhaps the man could have been saved.’

South Western Ambulance Trust extended its condolences but said it was ‘confident the crew made an appropriate risk assessment and administered the best possible care’. A spokesman added: ‘They would have been unable to administer any higher standard of life support on an upturned vehicle, in the middle of the water, than that which was already being performed by the individual on scene.’ The crew were concerned by the unknown depth of the water. If one of them got into trouble, it would have affected the treatment they could provide, the spokesman said. ‘The clinical preference would always have been to wait for the fire service to rescue the patient from the water. There is no question the paramedics made exactly the right choices and performed admirably.’

Tory councillor for neighbouring Cheddar, Dawn Hill, said: ‘Your natural instinct would be to jump in and help. It is very sad that health and safety laws stop paramedics from doing their job.’

My thoughts on this incident

The depth of the water in the ditch could have been gauged by the two men already standing in the water, or the amount of the Land Rover protruding from the water.
The paramedic crew would not enter the water, but PC Daly showed no hesitation. Wouldn’t PC Daly be subject to the same OHS legislation? How was his risk assessment so vastly different to that carried out by the paramedics?
Mr Rose, the coroner, asserts that alcohol was not the primary cause of the incident. I suggest that with a BAC of nearly 0.16%, that alcohol was a major contributing factor to the incident. In NSW (Australia) 0.15% constitutes high-range drink driving.
South Western Ambulance Trust insist the crew had to stay dry to provide ‘advanced life support’ such as defibrillation, which could have proved fatal for everyone at the scene if carried out too close to the water. This is true if defibrillation was carried out on the upturned vehicle in the ditch. But what ‘advanced life support’ can be administered with the casualty on the side of the car in the ditch, and the paramedics up on the roadway.
However, it is possible that Mr. Thornton’s traumatic head injury was such that he could not have been resuscitated, and drowning was secondary to that.
The driver of the vehicle Mr Braddick was convicted of drink-driving and banned from the road for three years. This seems to lenient in the extreme. In other jurisdictions this offence would have attracted a custodial sentence. Again in NSW, aggravated dangerous driving occasioning death carries a maximum penalty of 14 years imprisonment.

What do you think?