Top of the league tables for ambulance handovers

Trust welcomes Minister of State as it tops national ambulance handover league table

Edward Argar MP, Minister of State for Health, visited the Emergency Department at Leeds General Infirmary (LGI) in May. The Minister visited the team at the department to hear more about their leading ambulance handover times that have proved to be the fastest in the country.

In 2021/2022, the LGI was the best performing hospital across NHS trusts in England, with an average handover of 11 minutes and 3 seconds. This is a result of the collaboration between Leeds Teaching Hospitals and Yorkshire Ambulance Service (YAS) to reduce the amount of time it takes for ambulances to hand over patients into the care of the Emergency Department. This means that YAS colleagues are available to return to the community to support more patients who need urgent care fast. During his visit, the Minister was also introduced to some of the Trust’s clinicians that are trailing innovative and new technologies through the onsite Innovation Pop Up at the LGI. The Innovation Pop Up brings together clinicians and entrepreneurs to transform the latest advances in science, technology and engineering into products and services that can solve health and care challenges facing Britain and the rest of the world. It is also the first phase in establishing an Innovation Village in the five hectares of land that will be unlocked by the building of the Trust’s two new hospitals. Mr Argar joined neurosurgeons Mr Ryan Mathew and Dr Will Bolton to view and interact with a 3D model of the human brain using a virtual reality headset. ‘Digital surgical theatre’ like this, uses virtual and mixed reality for education, training, patient consultation and peri-operative management of surgical patients. It can also help with early detection of brain tumours.

Dame Linda Pollard, Chair of Leeds Teaching Hospitals, said: “We were delighted that we could introduce the Minister to just a small number of the improvements and innovations we have been introducing here in Leeds. Our staff are working hard to continually enhance the care we provide to our patients - from how we are improving working with our colleagues in the community to improve ambulance handovers to implementing pioneering technologies that are helping to improve surgical planning or produce diagnoses quicker.” Minister for Health Edward Argar said: “It was a real pleasure visiting Leeds Teaching Hospitals to see for myself the expert healthcare and specialist services the trust provides day in, day out for people across Leeds, Yorkshire and the Humber and beyond. We continue to work very closely with the Trust on the development of their new hospital scheme, part of the Government’s commitment to deliver 40 new hospitals by 2030.”