A scheme to have paramedics instead of police act as first responders to triple zero calls for mental health from September 1 has been deferred for an unspecified time.
More than 40 confidential spreadsheets containing the pre-employment drug test results of hundreds of graduate paramedics were posted on the Ambulance Victoria intranet,according to the Victorian Ambulance Union.
The state health minister conceded that despite some progress,more needed to be done to improve ambulance response times and surgery waiting lists.
Ambulance Victoria responded to the highest number of cases ever in the last quarter as response times suffered from the soaring demand.
The paramedic was trialling a new defibrillator method on a cardiac arrest patient when she received an electric shock that sent her across the room.
A primary-school-aged boy was airlifted to The Royal Children’s Hospital,while a man in his 50s and another in his 20s were taken to Wonthaggi Public Hospital after a perilous day at Venus Bay.
The ambulance bill was among a record number of complaints received by the Victorian Ombudsman for the second consecutive year,including grievances about a prison mouse plague and COVID restrictions.
The Emergency Services Telecommunications Authority’s failure to answer 90 per cent of calls requesting ambulances within five seconds is detailed in its annual report.
The ambulance service said some “lights and sirens” emergency calls were delayed due to the limited availability of ambulances over a three-hour period.
Weekend discharges and establishing a community paramedic program would go some way to reducing pressure on our health system.
Saving lives since 1973:Ambulance paramedic Lance Simmons has worked during some of Victoria’s biggest disasters and events.