Hertfordshire academic awarded for excellence in ambulance crew training

The award was for runner up in the category of Excellence in learning, teaching, development or mentorship in the Allied Health Professionals & Health Scientists annual awards, awarded this month, for a project entitled: Collaborative and innovative emergency and transport: automatic ventilation training course for ambulance staff.

The project was as a result of collaboration between the University of Hertfordshire, Andy Newton, Clinical Director and Consultant Paramedic of South East Coast Ambulance Service NHS Trust and former Paramedic Professional Lead at UH, and Professor David Barker, Consultant Medical Adviser, Smiths Medical International.

The team identified that ambulance staff are not sufficiently trained and encouraged to use an automatic ventilator.

They went on to develop training materials for a ventilation course which could be adopted within the University courses such as the Paramedic BSc or Post-Graduate Critical Care Paramedic programmes.

The course content includes theory, demonstrations and practice time with different types of automatic ventilators on simulation mannequins. The aim is to train ambulance crews to apply automatic ventilators safely and effectively, thereby increasing patient safety and the quality of care provided and reducing possible errors.

“The feedback we received about this course indicates that it enhanced participants’ clinical knowledge and understanding about the use of automatic ventilators,” said Guillaume. “The team, involving the South East Coast Ambulance Service NHS Trust is looking at developing other similar collaborative courses.”