Source · Select Committees · Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 15
15
Accepted
Significant regional disparities in ambulance response times, particularly impacting rural services.
Conclusion
In 2021–22, mean Category 1 ambulance response times varied from six minutes 51 seconds for the London ambulance service to ten minutes 20 seconds for the South-West ambulance service, and average 999 call response times ranged from 5.4 seconds for the West Midlands ambulance service to 67.4 seconds for the South-West ambulance service.35 We asked what could be done to address differences between ambulance services. NHS England accepted that ambulance response times were not at all where they needed to be over the winter. It added that ambulance services covering large rural areas, for example the services in the south-west and east of England, were particularly challenged and disproportionately affected by problems stemming from the flow of patients elsewhere in the system.36 It also told us that while all ambulances services worked in partnership with their local systems to develop solutions to treat more people in their homes and reduce admissions to hospital, there was variation in how this was being done.37
Government Response Summary
The government agrees with the committee's finding, stating NHS England is working to tackle unwarranted variation in ambulance performance through the UEC recovery plan, providing targeted support to challenged systems, and will provide an update in February 2024.
Government Response
Accepted
HM Government
Accepted
3.1 The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation. Target implementation date: February 2024 3.2 NHS England is working to tackle unwarranted variation in performance. Making improvements to Emergency Departments and ambulance performance requires working between secondary, primary, community and social care so the Urgent and Emergency Care (UEC) tiering support offer is taking place at system level to ensure a whole-system approach. 3.3 The UEC recovery plan aims to improve and standardise processes to reduce unwarranted variation in the in-hospital UEC pathway. Specifically, NHS England is working with systems to improve their UEC performance through standardising service in the first 72 hours of care, increasing direct referrals to specialist care and Same Day Emergency Care (SDEC,) including paediatric SDEC, with focus on equitable access and consistency of delivery. 3.4 NHS England’s approach will focus on providing maximum support to the most challenged systems, bringing in national experts, NHS England’s Emergency Care Improvement Team and a range of supporters from best practice organisations. A bespoke offer is provided to each system, helping them align their plans to ensure delivery of local UEC recovery. There has been significant improvement in emergency performance over 2023-24 compared to last year, and there is already evidence of these improvements in emergency performance being fastest in some of the most challenged. 3.5 NHS England will write to the Committee in February 2024 setting out the underlying causes of variation in performance as more information will be available at this time.