South Central Ambulance Service
NHS Foundation Trust
NEWS
September 2021
WELCOME Although it feels like summer spent a lot of time in hiding, we welcome you to our autumn newsletter.
Marcus’s Chippy Para 500
We know we said this before, but we would like to take this opportunity again to say a huge heartfelt thank you to everyone who has supported us. Since our last newsletter South Central Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust has continued to be under immense pressure meaning at a time when we would usually around 1600 emergency calls a day, we were receiving 2000. In addition, the number of calls to urgent medical advice line NHS 111 are at more than 4,500 a day – up from 3,000 a day pre-pandemic. With winter pressures just around the corner, your support is more important than ever before. It means so much to our staff and volunteers to know they are valued and appreciated by the community whom they serve.
Most importantly, your ongoing support enables us to help our teams when they need it most in providing the best possible patient care.
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www.scas.charity
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funds Report
NHS Charities Together’s Big Tea A Royal Invitation
Earlier this year SCAS Charity applied to NHS Charities Together for a grant to support our work. We were awarded just over £410,000 to fund three specific projects.
Hello my name is Mark Potts and I am one of the volunteer greens (CFRs) based in Caversham, Berkshire. When I received the call from Vanessa (CEO of South Central Ambulance Charity) asking if I was available to represent SCAS at a Tea Party at Buckingham Palace as part of NHS Charities Together’s NHS Big Tea.
Once outside the gates I was delighted to meet up with Tony Larks and Major Emma Allen MBE who were also representing SCAS at this amazing event, my first impression was that neither of them were wearing green socks so maybe I made the wrong choice.
I thought maybe she had called the wrong number, it was such a shock to be selected for such an honour out of the thousands of people who have worked so extremely hard to ensure that SCAS continued to deliver exceptional patient care even during the busiest of days. Once I got over the shock I was filled with several thoughts, what an honour, I wonder if I will get to talk to the royal hosts, how do I get into the palace, what do I wear, will my green socks go with my grey suit etc… The hardest part was being told to keep it confidential so even though I wanted to share my excitement I had to keep it quiet. Slowly more details emerged so some of the questions were answered, so suit and green socks it was. Finally, the day arrives and with a mixture of excitement and nervousness, I jump on a train and then take a gentle stroll to Buckingham Palace adding another few miles to my walking challenge to raise funds for the South Central Ambulance Charity.
Admission to the palace was an experience, the police unlocked one of the gates at the front of the palace, checked our ID and let us into the courtyard, once there I wondered what was going on, I was expecting to be at an event with several hundred NHS people, but there were literally a handful there. We then found that due to Covid restrictions the tea party was limited to just 30 guests, suddenly my nerves came back, I was not one of hundreds who may get a chance to chat with the Duke of Cambridge, I was one of just a handful and would certainly be spending some time chatting to him, what does one talk about to a future king? Once escorted round to the gardens we found a few nice tables set out for us, and the summer house was used to serve us tea, sandwiches, and cakes. According to one of the palace staff, he couldn’t remember in his 10 years of service ever using the summer house like this before so that was special. We also noticed several media representatives with TV and still cameras all over the place. The challenge now became making sure we were not caught on camera mid sandwich. There was also a royal guard’s band playing live music throughout the event, which was fantastic. I was asked to comment on the quality of the cakes, however
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Following receipt of this grant we were also awarded a further £269,000 in total from the four regional groups we are part of. These funds will ensure we can roll these out across our four counties. I didn’t partake much in those, the sponge I had was fantastic, but I didn’t sample the many other different types of cakes available, the sandwiches however were exquisite, obviously finger sandwiches with no crusts, the speciality was the cucumber and mint.
Funding will enhance the role of community first responders, who are dispatched to emergency incidents when every second counts – for example if someone isn’t breathing, has chest pains, is unconscious or fitting – to administer basic life support until a frontline ambulance response arrives.
Then the Duke of Cambridge arrives…
This grant will see the introduction of enhanced CFRs trained to deliver diagnostic testing with patients.
We were group together into tables of 6 people and the duke made his way around each table and spent time chatting to everyone, we were very fortunate to meet 3 lovely ladies from a hospital charity who shared our table with us and getting to know them and the amazing work they have also been doing was fantastic. Once the Duke got to our table Tony had the enviable task of remembering names and starting off the conversation, after that we just all jumped in, William was so easy to talk to, he made sure to engage with everyone at the table, and appeared genuinely interested in what we do, how we have coped and asked very engaging questions. Overall, he was talking with our table for around 20 minutes.
Such as urinalysis and electrocardiogram (ECG) and to relay their results to our clinical support desk. This will give our teams further knowledge about patients to ensure the right follow up treatment can be provided. Secondly, funding will help to increase the survival rates of patients with an out of hospital cardiac arrest. Seventeen new LUCAS 3 mechanical CPR devices have been made available to our clinical staff and the introduction of the GoodSAM application will enable us to provide a quicker response via any clinical or non-clinical individual who has been trained to deliver CPR.
We also had an opportunity to chat with Sir Simon Stevens (former CEO of NHS England) who also was very interested in our experiences.
we will be working with residential homes to provide training and equipment to support their residents
It was truly an amazing honour to attend this event, but even though I was one of the lucky ones who got to attend this fantastic event, I was just a token representative and the thanks from the Duke and Duchess goes to each and every one of our volunteer CFRs.
They will have a greater understanding of the pathways available to them when a resident needs additional support. This will prevent unnecessary calls to 999 when other options would be more appropriate and in turn mean better, more appropriate care for residents.
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CFR News Dee Harnett is a CFR in Beaconsfield and recently decided to take on the Cotswold Classic, a middle distance Triathlon.
OUTRUN AN AMBULANCE
She said that during Covid she wanted to do something to help her local area so signed up as a CFR and was now looking to also fundraise for the Charity to provide much needed kit.
When our colleagues from South Western Ambulance Charity shared with us a new virtual challenge they had created, we couldn’t wait to hear more.
Great effort Dee, well done CFR Mark Thompson works for Wood Plc, one of the world’s leading consulting and engineering companies operating across energy and the build environment. The company recognises that achieving a sustainable future is one of the biggest challenges facing our generation and it underpins all they do. Mark approached the Community Investment Committee at Wood who were delighted to match fund Mark’s volunteer commitment to SCAS with a donation of £5000.
THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH Berkshire CFR Paul Robson successfully submitted a grant application to local Earley Town Council and was delighted to be awarded a grant of £250 to support his local scheme.
thank you Paul
Thank you to our supporters
Participants try to conquer the same mileage an emergency ambulance covers in one shift. With three months to complete the challenge by running, walking, cycling, scooter, all they had to do was outrun the ambulance by one mile. Our participants absolutely smashed it with one of our very own CFRs Tony Larks clocking up an amazing 979 miles. Not only did he decide to out run one ambulance he actually outran seven and raised an amazing £8130. Every one of our participants did a fantastic job raising an amazing £13,345.72. Residents of Popes Court in Totton were inspired by the challenge and decided to join in. Working as a team, they walked every day over a twomonth period covering 166 miles. Driving force behind the challenge was resident Eileen, who planned the routes and mileages for each of the participants. Those not able to take part gladly took the opportunity to donate. Many of the residents have said they feel much better for the regular exercise which they hope to continue. The team raised a brilliant £690!
www.scas.charity
As a small regional charity, we are fully appreciative of every single donation we receive. Below is just a handful of some of those who have supported us.
Buckinghamshire Freemasons have awarded a grant of £2902 to our Princes Risborough team to fully equip their latest CFR recruit. The grant awarded by the Masonic Charitable Foundation has enabled the team to expand and boost patient care the team are able to deliver in the area. Earlier in the year we started working we started working towards a phased replacement of defibrillators in our Community First Responder (CFR) kits that are more than 10 years old, which are coming to the end of their life. The most vital piece of equipment in a CFRs kit is their defibrillator and as such is the most expensive. It has the capability to save and change lives but comes at a cost of around £1200 each. Overall, we want to replace around 300 defibs across the South Central Ambulance Service patch by the end of 2024.
To start us off on this venture we have received two generous donations. Arnold Clark Community Fund – kindly awarded us £1000 in May. Then during July we were delighted to receive, notification from The Hendy Foundation whom have also kindly awarded us a grant of £2000 to replace two CFR defibrillators.
Book your next holiday and raise money for SCAS at the same time! Towards the end of 2020, we were delighted that Alex Harding at Not Just Travel chose the South Central Ambulance Charity to be his beneficiary charity. As travel and holidays were heavily restricted, our partnership was put on hold until now as international travel is making a slow and steady return through 2021 and back in full swing for 2022. Alex has kindly pledged to donate part of his commission due from the sale of of travel. The commission due will be donated by Not Just Travel directly to the Charity and will not affect the cost of the holiday to the customer so this is a win/ win all round. You get personal service before, during and after you travel at no additional cost and the SCAS Charity benefits at the same time! Thank you Alex for this generous contribution. We look forward to growing this partnership over the next 12 months. To find out more about where you next holiday adventure could take you, call Alex on our dedicated partner number 0330 3206100 or email at alex. harding@notjusttravel.com Happy Holidays!
LOTTERY One of the easiest ways to support our charitable work is to sign up to our weekly lottery costing just £1 per entry. Each £1 entry has 1 in 63 chance of winning one of four fantastic prizes £25, £1000, £25000, or 5 entries into the next draw. So not only are you supporting your local ambulance charity you are also giving yourself a chance of winning too. It’s a win, win! To sign up go to https://tinyurl.com/2jw5xuuu
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CFR Activity 16,297 emergency calls
14,277 of them had a cfr first on the scene
Since our last newsletter, our CFRs and Co Responders have attended 16,297 incidents during the period 1st April to 31st August 2021. Our CFRs & Co Responders have been first on scene with a patient for 14,277 incidents. This means that they were able to start treating the patient quickly whilst the attending ambulance was on its way.
We would like to say a huge thank you to all of our Responders and the teams behind them that help make our volunteer programme the success it is. If you feel you have what it takes to become a CFR and you are in any of the areas list below then please visit www.scas.charity/get-involved
Abingdon | Banbury | Bicester | Oxford City Wallingford | Wantage | Witney Our fundraisers, supporters and Responders have continued to go above and beyond in many ways in the last 4 months and we would love to tell you about all of them. However, we have had to select some highlights to share with you. You can still keep up to date with everything we are up to by following us on our Twitter @scacharity, on Facebook South Central Ambulance Charity and our website www. scas.charity Thank you.
KEEP AN EYE OUT FOR We are giving our website a revamp and hope to launch it mid-November.
129,460
Christmas is a time to gift so make sure you stay tuned into our social media channels and website to find out how you can donate to your local ambulance service this Christmas.
HOURS ON DUTY
Our events calendar for 2022 – we are working on some new events for next year, so stay tuned to get the most up to date information.
1065 volunteers
Our amazing volunteers have been available and on call for 129,460 hours! Which I am sure you will agree is amazing and vital in these current times.
We will be sending our newsletter out to supporters three times a year. A chance for us to let you know what we are up to and how we are spending the fantastic donations we receive. If you would prefer not to continue receiving our newsletter please respond to this email adding Unsubscribe as the subject heading and we will remove you from our list.
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