Response from the London Ambulance Service on medical treatment of people kept in police 'kettles'

The response below is from the London Ambulance Service to the Vice Chair of the LAS Patients Forum. I also asked a question along these lines at the last LAS NHS Trust Board meeting last month.

Dear Malcolm

In such cases any one ill or injured, public or otherwise, would be treated in accordance with normal treatment regimens. We do have a specialist unit who are either pre-deployed if it is a planned event, or can be assembled if it is a spontaneous event. They are specially equipped, (personal protection), and trained to deal with such incidents which can by their very nature, be very volatile. (It is not unknown for LAS staff to come under strong verbal abuse, and occasionally physical threat. (This was seen at Notting Hill a couple of years when missiles were thrown at what were quite obviously LAS & St John members of staff. (A St. John vehicle was also badly damaged)).

If we are made aware that someone is ill or injured in a crowd that is being contained, then staff will make contact with the Police and work out the safest method of extraction. This may mean being escorted into the crowd, or the patient being brought to our staff by Police Medics. Every situation is different and has to be dealt with differently. The staff on the ground will, under the direction of the LAS Command Team, always liaise with the Police, so that they are aware that we have / might have a patient in an area where the public are being contained. These situations are also exercised, (very realistically), by our staff and the Police at the Public Order Range at Gravesend.

If during such an event EOC receive a call from someone within a “contained” area, they will pass details to the “Event Control” if one has been set up, (normally for pre-planned scenarios); or they will pass it to the Command Team on the Ground for deployment of the most suitable response. This really does depend at what stage the incident is at. Containment normally happens after quite a while so a Silver Command Team will have been established and will be on site.



I hope this assists

Regards,

David Whitmore DIMC RCSEd

Senior Clinical Adviser to the Medical Director

London Ambulance Service NHS Trust

220 Waterloo Road

London

SE1 8SD

020 7783 2092 - Direct Line

07899 965712 - Mobile

020 7921 5127 – Fax

E-mail - david.whitmore@lond-amb.nhs.uk