East of England Ambulance Service received millions in additional funding for student paramedic programme
20 February 2015
East of England Ambulance Service received millions of pounds worth of additional funding towards a programme to recruit and train new student paramedics following a fine meted out last year for failing to meet performance targets.
Fri, 20 Feb 2015East of England Ambulance Service received millions of pounds worth of additional funding towards a programme to recruit and train new student paramedics following a fine meted out last year for failing to meet performance targets.
The service was fined £1.2m in 2014 over failures to reach 75% of life-threatening emergencies within eight minutes.
In response to the fine, East of England Ambulance Service launched a successful recruitment drive and training programme last January for 400 student paramedics, which it hopes to repeat this year.
Under the training programme student paramedics go through eight weeks of training in the classroom and three weeks of emergency driver training before starting on the front line. They receive an additional three weeks of classroom training within their first nine months. During the 12 to 18 months that follow, studies involve a mix of classroom and practical work delivered through either the University of East Anglia or Anglia Ruskin University.
An East of England Ambulance Service spokesman told Recruiter the Service received an extra £9.5m from clinical commissioning groups last year and £4.2m from Health Education England towards the student paramedic programme, which funded improvements to ambulance vehicles, the recruitment drive itself and training of the new recruits.
He added the funding for this year’s recruitment drive has come from a mix of savings generated from management and administrative costs, support from commissioners and Health Education England.
Following last year’s recruitment campaign the service received more than 4,000 applications from candidates, 200 of which have already been hired in this financial year.
The service was fined £1.2m in 2014 over failures to reach 75% of life-threatening emergencies within eight minutes.
In response to the fine, East of England Ambulance Service launched a successful recruitment drive and training programme last January for 400 student paramedics, which it hopes to repeat this year.
Under the training programme student paramedics go through eight weeks of training in the classroom and three weeks of emergency driver training before starting on the front line. They receive an additional three weeks of classroom training within their first nine months. During the 12 to 18 months that follow, studies involve a mix of classroom and practical work delivered through either the University of East Anglia or Anglia Ruskin University.
An East of England Ambulance Service spokesman told Recruiter the Service received an extra £9.5m from clinical commissioning groups last year and £4.2m from Health Education England towards the student paramedic programme, which funded improvements to ambulance vehicles, the recruitment drive itself and training of the new recruits.
He added the funding for this year’s recruitment drive has come from a mix of savings generated from management and administrative costs, support from commissioners and Health Education England.
Following last year’s recruitment campaign the service received more than 4,000 applications from candidates, 200 of which have already been hired in this financial year.
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