The National Ambulance Service (NAS) HSE Mid West responded to a total of 32,900 calls in 2024, new figures have revealed.
However, the NAS hasn’t provided Councillor Mary Howard with a breakdown of the total number of ambulance call-outs in Clare last year much to her disappointment.
There were 16,411 Category One calls for life-threatening issues, 12,056 Category Two for serious but not life-threatening calls and 4,433 Category Three non serious calls made across the region last year.
Councillor Howard is very disappointed with the NAS reply as she believes that it is not rocket science to collate a caller’s location using the first three digits of their Eircode without compromising GDPR regulations.
“For every 999 call, the first question a caller is asked is to produce their Eirecode. It should be very easy to process from that where the calls are coming from. A county by county breakdown should be available as well as a breakdown within the county.
“It is not rocket science and I find it very frustrating that I couldn’t get a straight answer. It is a very accurate barometer for the amount of Clare patients that need an ambulance.
“I was looking for the figures because I believe there is a need for an operational ED in Ennis. There are plenty of number crunchers in the HSE who could put together the figures based on the first three digits of an Eircode, such as V95 is Ennis.
“Everybody is not living near a motorway and can’t travel to University Hospital Limerick in 30 minutes. There are a lot of people living on rural roads and people coming from West and North Clare.
“I live on the Lahinch Road and see multiple ambulances going up and down the road,” she said.
NAS General Manager Area Operations, Niall Murray outlined NAS report monthly on Purple and Red call activity, category AS1 life threatening cardiac or respiratory arrest or life threatening other than cardiac or respiratory arrest calls.
“Response times per county or IHA are not deemed a Key Performance Indicator (KPI) for the Health Information Quality Authority (HIQA), the Department of Health (DoH) or theNational Ambulance Service (NAS). Therefore, reporting and publishing of response times on a county by county or IHA basis is not a requirement,” he said.
Councillor Howard also asked for the number of times Clare-based NAS crews attended incidents in other counties, what counties and number of incidents.
In line with international best practice, Mr Murray stated the NAS operates a dynamic deployment model which results in the closest ambulance being tasked to respond to high acuity Purple calls – life threatening cardiac or respiratory or Red calls – life threatening illness or injury other than cardiac or respiratory arrest).
This call taking and dispatch function is operated by the NAS National Emergency Operations Centre (NEOC) which operates across two sites, Dublin and Ballyshannon. All NAS resources are dispatched to calls across the country from the NEOC on a nearest available to the incident basis and not on a county boundary basis.
“KPIs are set based on the expected level of rising demand compared to the level of funded capacity available to respond to that demand.
“KPIs set out in the NSP are national aggregate targets rather than locality-based targets and reflect the geographical and rurality challenges and diversity faced in achieving such targets. Therefore, reporting and publishing of response times on a county by county or IHA basis is not a requirement,” he stated.
In a statement sent to Councillor Howard this week, Mr Murray confirmed the concerns she had raised at the Regional Health Forum regarding NAS reporting data on a regional rather than county basis have been communicated to NAS senior leadership and reiterated what he had stated previously.
East Clare correspondent, Dan Danaher is a journalism graduate of Rathmines and UL. He has won numerous awards for special investigations on health, justice, environment, and reports on news, agriculture, disability, mental health and community.