Other London Ambulance Service Blogs
I’m hard at work right now, so here are some links to other LAS blogs.
I’m sure you’ve all read the fantastic mother of all ambulance blogs, Random Acts of Reality — most of you probably found this blog because of it, but I mention it for the sake of completeness and just in case any of you have been in a coma for the last year.
Newbie at CAC is the blog of one of my newly acquired colleagues. Reading her (his?) experiences made me realise I can be a bit of a cynical old git at times, and later on I’m going to try and pull out some of my diary entries from when I started at Nee Naw Control to see if I too was “fresh faced and eager” or if I have always been this jaded.
Finally, The World Through The Eyes of an EMT is another ambulance technician blog, brand new and sparkling, and contains some interesting entries about The Way The Nee Naw Service works.
Any other London Ambulance Service employees out there with blogs? Or how about any emergency operators or dispatchers for police, fire and other ambulance services? If you know of any, please leave a comment!
on October 14th, 2005 at 3:26 pm
Thanks for the mention Nee Naw! I give it about another 10 shifts before I become just as cynical!! Keep up the good work! Maybe see you in NeeNaw Control one of these days - or mabe we’ve already met without knowing it!
on October 14th, 2005 at 4:02 pm
Maybe! I’m going to keep eyeing up all those blue shouldered types until I work out which one is you!
on October 14th, 2005 at 6:03 pm
http://randomreality.blogware.com/blog
That is where I originally found a link to this one.
on October 14th, 2005 at 6:47 pm
You and about a thousand others, I suspect
on October 14th, 2005 at 11:20 pm
I’m also in the room. on the 9’s pretty often too, so totally sympathise with everything on your blog.
If i’ve worked things out right, i think i’ve sussed out who you are tho..in fact, i reckon i’ve been ctc when you’ve been on too….
Good work anyway - i’ve always meant to do a blog about Cac but always thought i’d end getting into grief with the stuff i’d put in it.
Tom.
on October 14th, 2005 at 11:26 pm
Who am I then? Don’t post it here, email me… I’d be interested to see if you’re right!
mark (at) neenaw.co.uk
on October 15th, 2005 at 12:11 am
Woo-hoo! My turn to be famous - thanks Mark
on October 15th, 2005 at 5:46 am
I just recently found your blog and l love it ! Keep up the good work ! I’m in the somewhat unique position of having been a dispatcher both in the UK and the US. I was a police dispatcher in London,went onto become a bobby in central London,then emigrated to the US and was a Sheriff’s dispatcher in Florida,then transferred to the Florida Highway Patrol as a dispatcher.I’m now back with the Sheriff but in another bureau that has little public contact…Hooray
on October 16th, 2005 at 11:45 pm
Might be a few more over at workblogging.blogspot.com.
on October 17th, 2005 at 9:10 am
Alan: It would be interesting to hear the differences between the job in the US and here. What the the best/worst bits of both.
on October 18th, 2005 at 2:59 am
mmm l’ll have to give that one some more thought..but off the top of my head,the basics of the job are the same on both sides,.and u certainly get the same stupid timewasting calls on both sides of the pond,and loads of 911 hangups or abandoned calls for police as they were called in London.For example a lot of people call 911 and when u says “What’s your emergency” (or words to that effect),they’ll say”Well,it’s not an emergency but……..” l don’t know if it’s done in the UK but here,when pagers were all the rage and u wanted someone to call home urgently,you would just type in 911 and the more intelligent ones amongst the population would call home,..so l answer “911 what’s your emergency ? ” and dumbass says ” Did someone there page me ? ” People like that shouldn’t be allowed out alone..but don’t get me started on that…lol. One of the main differences is that here,when u dial 911,you don’t go thru to a phone company operator asking you which service you want..ALL 911 calls go thru to the Police/Sheriff depending if the subscriber is in the city or the county.Interestingly in California, all 911 calls made from mobile phones are routed to the Calif Highway Patrol first.Another difference is that there are no ambulance services as such,in terms of first response to 911 calls l mean. In the US,when u want a nee naw..the fire dept responds ! All firefighters here are all EMT’s or Paramedics.In the bigger/busier places,FD paramedics respond initially then if the call turns out to be L.O.B.(Load of b*llocks)as we used to say in London,then they call a private nee naw company to do the transporting to the E.R.The private ones generally just deal with BLS calls,while the FD medics handle the ALS calls. I think the police here go out on far more crap calls than they do in the UK. Our last Sheriff had a policy of ..If someone requests a deputy,we WILL send one..so of course the yanks being the drama queens that they are,are one the phone every five mins reporting all manner of garbage and suspicious incidents and demanding to see a deputy…these are the same people that say “We never see the police/sheriff on patrol around here”…NO because they haven’t got any bloody time to do routine patrol,they’re running from one crap call to the next for the entire shift…there l go again getting all worked up..lol. Watch this space for the next installment
on October 18th, 2005 at 1:34 pm
Alan: Interesting. So it’s not only this country that is going bonkers.
on October 19th, 2005 at 9:39 am
“Well, it’s not an emergency but…” is something I hear a lot of too and I find it a bit mindboggling… however, I don’t say anything until they tell me what the non-emergency is, because I’ve learned that people’s perceptions of “emergency” have very little relation to whether it is an emergency or not. eg. “It’s not really an emergency, I didn’t want to bother you, but I’ve been having these crushing chest pains and pains down my left arm and…”
NEE NAW NEE NAW NEE NAW!!!!
on October 21st, 2005 at 9:10 am
In my experience when they say “Well it’s not really an emergency…” then is usually isn’t…it’s very rare that someone will call the non-emergency number when they actually have an emergency..but people call 911/999 continously with non-emergency calls.In fact,again,in my experience,probably 75%,if not more,of all “emergency” calls don’t require an immediate/urgent response and are anything BUT an emergency. I’m talking about calls for police service mainly as l’ve never been an EMD,but l have absolutely no doubt that LAS gets a lot of crap 999 calls,just the same as LFB and the Met…to bad they can’t be fined for misusing the service,and I’m talking about the type of call where they say “Sorry but l couldn’t find your number in the book” and “Where can l get a taxi ? ” Allow me to give u the number for directory enquiries !
on October 21st, 2005 at 9:19 am
We don’t have a proper “non emergency” number like you do, which is a shame. As well as the rubbish calls for taxis/pizza hut/etc we also get quite a few calls, mainly from the elderly, for things like “my heating is broken and the council is closed til 9am” “I can’t get to the shops to buy any food” “my carer hasn’t turned up” etc and I feel really sorry for these people because they often sound desperate but at the end of the day we are just an ambulance service and can’t do anything. I wish there was a “miscellaneous emergency help” service but I have a feeling it would get overrun and misused…
on September 2nd, 2006 at 8:45 am
There is a new non emergency number being rolled out across the UK, live now in Hampshire and Lancashire.. just dial 101 !
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