Dear J Lowe

Thank you for your email dated 5th July 2014 where you requested information regarding the East of England Ambulance Service.

Your request will be dealt with under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and we will respond to you within twenty working days. Your request has been allocated the following reference: F18249 and I would be grateful if you could quote this reference in any future correspondence with the Trust.

If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact me.

Yours sincerely

FoI Officer
East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust

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Dear J Lowe

Further to your email dated 5th July 2014, please find the Trust's response below

Incidents concerning breathing problems

Can you tell me for the first 6 months of this year, how many times an RRV has subsequently requested a "Hot 1" backup i.e. the most immediate, to these types of calls?
1868

Also, what is the longest it has taken for a subsequent Hot 1 backup to arrive?
The longest back up response is 1hr 13mins 10seconds. This is why the Trust is recruiting 400 student paramedics this year, of which more than 120 have already started their training or working on ambulances. Recruiting more front line staff and increasing ambulance cover are two of the trust’s six priorities and these will reduce ambulance delays to patients and reduce back up delays.

I'd also like to know how many of these types of calls resulted in a patient going on to have a respiratory or cardiac arrest. Kindly produce information for this from the beginning of 2011.
In terms of respiratory/cardiac arrest, the Trust does not record cases where the clinical impression is either ‘difficulty breathing’ or ‘short of breath’ we only record cases that have a clinical impression of Cardiac arrest where some form of CPR has been carried out on scene by a bystander or trust. In order to extract and collate this information we would manually have to go through each of the incident records. As a result the Trust has calculated that this would take longer than eighteen hours and therefore would exceed the appropriate limit as defined by the Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004 and as such we are unable to answer this part of your request.

Further, how many serious incidents ("SIs") has the Trust had over that period relating to calls for patients with breathing problems?
The Trust had 6 SIs that related to a RED triage for breathing difficulties. The Trust is reviewing the recommendations in the recently published national report, `Why asthma still kills; the national review of asthma deaths.’ The learning from the SIs will further reinforce the processes in place to better care for patients with breathing difficulties wherever possible.

I am obliged to advise you that if you are dissatisfied with the Trust’s response to your request you have a right to complain to the Trust and should set out your concerns to the Freedom of Information Officer, EEAST, Hospital Approach, Broomfield, Chelmsford, Essex, CM1 7WS or by email to [East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust request email]. If you remain dissatisfied following this, you have a right under Section 50 of the FOIA to seek a determination from the Information Commissioner on whether the Act has been properly applied by the Trust. For more information, please see www.ico.gov.uk.

Please do not hesitate to contact me should you require any further information.

Kind regards

FoI Officer
East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust

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