Thank you to all Staff, Supervisors, Managers and Volunteers

Colleagues,

The health service continues to experience extreme and unprecedented pressures across a range of services, including the National Ambulance Service (NAS). The impact of these pressures is being borne by both our patients who need our assistance and our staff, supervisors and managers who have once again stepped up to meet those challenges and work hard to ensure we are doing the best we can for our patients.

The escalation plans we have in place, complemented by the additional investment through our Winter Plan, means that the preparatory work we have completed with a range of organisations throughout 2022 is being brought to bear to support the needs of our patients during this time.

A key part of our contingency planning is the commitment and support of the many volunteers across Ireland whether they are Community First Responder Schemes supported by CFR Ireland, Critical Care Doctors supported by Irish Community Rapid Response and other associated charities, Voluntary Ambulance Organisations such as the Order of Malta Ambulance Corps, the Irish Red Cross or St. John’s Ambulance Brigade or from organisations such as the Civil Defence, Local Authority Fire Services or the Irish Coast Guard.

As part of our plans, volunteers have and continue to support our patients and our staff by:

• Providing a first response to life threatening incidents
  Conducting welfare checks on patients
  Responding to older patients whom have experienced a fall at home
  Supporting the discharge of patients from acute hospitals

Each of these activities contributes enormously to our overall response to meet the needs of our patients. In this context, we wanted to say a sincere thank you to all of our staff, supervisors and managers and in particular, all of the many volunteers for everything you have and are continuing to do for our patients.

Yours Sincerely
Robert Morton

Director

and

Professor Cathal O’Donnell

Clinical Director

National Ambulance Service