Ambulance action sought

Press, 23 October 1989, Page 1

Ambulance action sought

By

SARONA IOSEFA

Ambulance officers want urgent action from the Minister of Health, Ms Clark, to give them the same legal protection as other paramedical ' professions, such as chiropractors. The national president of the Institute of Ambulance Officers, Mr Bernard Chatterton, said, “It’s ridiculous that with the situation of great stress and pressure that we work under we are unprotected should anyone test our case in court.”

The issue of legal protection was presented in a paper to this week-end’s conference of the Institute of Ambulance Officers,

held in Christchurch. Its author, Dr Noel Potter, is a general practitioner made an honorary fellow of the institute for his services in training its members. Mr Chatterton said it was generally accepted by doctors that ambulance officers were qualified to administer drugs and some intravenous fluids at the scene of accidents to resuscitate victims and stabilise heart rhythms. “It’s more or less taking the hospital out to the victim and treating them on the spot.

“But one day an ambulance officer is going to inadvertently

give an overdose, and that’s when our case is tested in court. We may have no comeback at all,” Mr Chatterton said. Mr Chatterton said 18 years ago all one needed to become an ambulance officeer was a firstaid certificate.

“That was fine when all you did was scrape the person up off the side of the road and race them to hospital, where they were treated. But now we are expected to try and treat them on the scene.” Mr Chatterton said ambulance officers would do all they could to get some assurance from the Minister of Health and backing from other health workers.