You will I am sure be pleased to hear that Upton is the first village in this area to set up its own Community Responder Group.
9 volunteers from the village have undertaken a NHS training course and all have passed an assessment to allow them to help out in the case of a medical emergency in the village. The 9 have organised themselves into a rota such that for most of the week, both day and night, at least one of them will be available to be asked by the 999 operator to attend an emergency and handle the situation until the ambulance arrives. It is hoped and intended that by having the right equipment and trained personnel within the village, parishioners will receive treatment much quicker than waiting for an ambulance and this reduced time will greatly increase the chances of a full recovery from the likes of strokes and heart attacks.
In operating the system there are some do’s and don’ts for both the volunteers and for the parishioners.
If you require emergency help, your first action must be to dial 999 or get someone to dial 999 for you. Do not call one of the volunteers before calling the emergency services unless you require help from the volunteer to make the emergency call. As soon as you call 999 the operator will decide whether a volunteer will be able to assist you and will immediately mobilise the volunteer who is on duty.
If after making an emergency call you are unable to answer your door please be aware that it is not permissible for a volunteer (or an ambulance crew) to use any force to gain entry to your property so please consider your present arrangements. If you live on your own why not ask someone living local to you to hold a key or know the details of your keypad. If you do have to call the emergency services and you are immobilised you may then also call your key holder such that when a volunteer or the ambulance arrives there will be instant access. Please consider making myself aware of who your key holder is such that I can draw up a list for use by the volunteers, it is absolutely vital that they know who to contact if they cannot get into you such that valuable minutes are not lost waiting for the police to arrive to gain access to you.
Please help us to find you. As all the volunteers live in the village they are more likely to know where you live than will members of the ambulance service but they will only be given the name or number of your house and the name of the road. All volunteers cannot be expected to know the names of all the houses so please make sure your house name or number is prominently displayed and can be seen and read from the road. If you have called the emergency services it may save valuable seconds if you get someone out in the road to wave down the volunteers and the ambulance. If it is after dark switch on as many lights as you can so that your house can be quickly picked out.
I am sure that most of you are grateful to know of the presence of the group of volunteers in our village, whilst we all hope we will not need their help it is reassuring to know that our chances of making a full recovery are greatly improved by their being on call. Data has been produced that indicates that by getting help to you just 2-3 minutes quicker in the first 10 minutes after the problem occurs will greatly increase your recovery chances. We appreciate the time the volunteers have already given up to undergo the training, the time they will have to give up in undertaking refresher courses and continued assessment and the time and effort put in by NHS staff in providing the training. We also appreciate the willingness of the volunteers to jump out of bed to help a fellow parishioner particularly if an incident occurs in the small hours of the night in the middle of winter.
Please be aware that the South Central Ambulance Service League of Friends have made available to our group, equipment to the value of £1600 that could help to save your life. Whilst we do not have to immediately pay for the equipment we are looking to repay the sum to this charitable organisation over a period of time such that they may continue to assist other groups to set up in the district. If you could consider making a donation I will be pleased to call to collect it.
If you are interested in joining the group of volunteers please give me a call.
Mike Brown
850135