Development and Implementation

of new Pre-hospital Ambulance Pathways

...providing more opportunities for staff to make decisions about assessment and treatment earlier or direct patients along more appropriate pathways of care

Explored:

• The epidemiology and costs of current care pathways
• Paramedic decision making on early identification of conditions, treatment
• Appropriate pathways to community-based care

The Community and Health Research Unit (CaHRU)

A new pathway was implemented and ambulance staff were educated to refer older people who had fallen at home to appropriate community-based care...

Ambulance services and staff are providing 

more emergency care to greater numbers of patients...

CaHRU explored how call-handlers could identify more people who are in or at-risk of imminent cardiac arrest...

Implemented a new pathway for patients with low blood sugar that involves referral to a Diabetes Specialist Nurse who can discuss why the patient had low blood sugar and how to avoid it in the future...  

They found early indications that treatment with a glyceryl trinitrate (GTN) patch started in the ambulance and continued daily for a week could reduce disability from stoke...

...this information has

informed  a major ambulance trial, RIGHT2,  for assessing and treating stroke patients

… and researched the complexities of paramedic decision making and how this could be made safer

...which informed changes in care described in a NICE evaluated Quality and Productivity case study

!

... the information booklet developed as part of this research has been publicised as a resource on the Diabetes UK website

WHAT THIS MEANS FOR ME... 

WHERE CAN I FIND MORE INFORMATION?

Patients with low blood glucose are receiving more appropriate care

Ambulance staff have  been involved in major trials of treatments for stroke, falls and hypos with potential benefits for patients

Older people who suffer falls are receiving more appropriate community-based care

The research is featured in a review of pre-hospital research by the National Institute for Health Research

... and in the future could affect national and international policy changes, guidelines and further implementation and uptake of ambulance pathways