More than 30,000 “999” calls made to the Northern Ireland Ambulance Service (NIAS) in the 12 months to 31 October last were neither life-threatening nor serious, figures released show.
In releasing the figures, the Ambulance Service stressed anyone in a life threatening or serious situation and who needed an ambulance should call for one immediately.
However, the Service said were other calls that contributed to the 30,000 calls for which there were options other than “999” ambulance.
An NIAS spokesperson said: “It may be that a visit to a pharmacy or a GP may offer the best personal solution and also ease the pressure on the ambulance service and emergency departments as we head into what is traditionally the busiest time of the year.”
The spokespeson said the message from the NIAS was is “a simple one” – “keep ambulances for real emergencies.”
The spokesperson added: “Each time an ambulance responds to a ‘999’ call it will, depending on whether it is in an urban or rural area, be unavailable to respond to other calls for at least one hour.
The spokesperson concluded: “If we are tied up responding to calls which did not actually require emergency response it also means we may be unavailable to respond, as quickly as we would like, to those patients suffering cardiac arrest or who have been involved in a serious road traffic collision – calls where every second really does count.”
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