Largest ever survey of patients treated by country’s busiest ambulance service to help shape the future of care in London

Patients who have called 999 for London Ambulance Service are being asked to have their say about the care they received – helping to shape and improve the service for the future.

The two-minute 999 Patient Survey– the first of its kind in the organisation’s history – provides a way for patients to share their entire experience from their initial 999 call or conversations with clinicians over the phone to the care provided by frontline crews.

As well as their overall experience, respondents will be asked questions about how quickly they were helped, how involved they felt in decisions about their care and the compassion shown by our staff.

A new ‘share your feedback’ page on the on the LAS website will more clearly direct people to all the ways to leave feedback. Leaflets given to patients who are treated by clinicians but not taken to hospital will include a QR code linking to the survey. Partner organisations have been asked to promote it directly to communities and key patient groups through their communication channels to boost response rates.

LAS is also reaching to patient representative groups like Healthwatch and Health and Wellbeing boards and NHS commissioning bodies called Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) to get regular insights about our services.

Director of 999 Operations Stuart Crichton, said:

“This survey will allow us to hear first-hand from patients about their experiences to gain a better understanding of what we are getting right, and more importantly, what we might need to do to improve the care we provide.

“In addition to the patient survey, we will be gathering as much information and views from as many people as we can including patient groups and our healthcare partners. It’s a great chance for them to have their say so we can look at how we can make healthcare better for Londoners.

“We want to hear from as many people as possible – so if you have dialled 999 for London Ambulance, please tell us how we did.”

London Ambulance Service answers around 6,000 999 calls and treats around 3,500 patients on scene or over the phone every day.

The government’s NHS 10-year plan asks all NHS organisations take a strong approach to capturing and learning from the experiences of patients. And when the trust reviewed its current approach, it agreed strengthening existing patient engagement arrangements was a priority for the year ahead.

There is already a survey for callers to 111 services, but the revised 111 survey, new 999 survey and renewed engagement with partners will offer greater insights about performance and fill gaps in our knowledge about views of service users.

Questions are ordered to ensure respondents answer our highest priority questions first. To maximise response rates, the short survey uses easy to understand language.

Patients will also be asked for their postal area and about conditions, disabilities or other health problems to help identify common themes in general locations and among specific patient groups to inform targeted improvements.