Patient Transport Service
Medical Services is the largest independent provider of planned patient transport solutions to the NHS and private healthcare organisations across England and Wales. We operate both contractual arrangements and through a high quality nationwide on-demand service.
With a wealth of experience and expertise in both patient transport services and the general transport industry, coupled with substantial resources and service infrastructure we are able to provide a first class, patient focused operation.
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Our Staff
Medical Services’ staff are the back bone of the organisation and we ensure that recruitment processes attract the right caring individuals and that our vetting and security systems are 100%. Our staff undergoes exceptional in-house training, backed up by robust policy and procedures throughout the organisation.
Training
Staff training is carried out internally by our own Health Safety Executive and IHCD accredited instructors at our accredited Centres of Excellence ambulance stations in Bow, East London, Alperton, West London, Neath, Wales, Warrington, Cheshire , as well as our HQ building near Old Street in London.
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Vehicles
Our fleet department has a dedicated software solution to ensure maintenance, repairs, servicing, MOTs, Road Fund Licences, safety inspections are all scheduled and implemented to maintain a safe fleet.
As an organisation, we have a flexible fleet replacement policy and strive to utilise the most green and efficient vehicles. Our fleet of Hybrid Toyota Prius cars give patients a comfortable journey, while being extremely economic and producing minimal harmful emissions into the environment.
Servicing of all vehicles follows manufacturer’s specified guidelines and schedules. Coupled with this, our own workshops will carry out six- weekly safety inspections and more regular deep cleans aimed at maximum infection control. We place great emphasis on infection control involving in vehicle and equipment cleanliness and staff protocols and procedures.
Technology
All vehicles are satellite tracked, linking into our booking and control system. This allows an up to the moment view of resources anywhere in the UK. A complete trace of an individual vehicle's route, speed, pin points of where the vehicle has stopped and if ignition has been turned off at any point.
All ambulance crews and ambulance car drivers have hand held XDA devices which are able to use data, voice and text. XDA devices receive journey details and upload key performance milestones in terms of the patient’s journey; i.e. patient collection time, arrival time at hospital, collection time from the hospital and arrival time at home. This data is fed directly back into our booking and control software to ensure that whole patient journey records are kept. Records are kept and backed up on a totally secure server, further allowing in depth data and performance reporting to our customers.
Our booking system can deliver our clients a responsive and effective reporting tool to allow demand and quality of service to be monitored at every given point of service provision.
A unique feature is the ‘Quality Dashboard’ which allows the authorised officer a secure log on to our system to access a snapshot of key performance indicators of the service we are providing to your patients. This can be selected for any time period and gives a system generated snapshot of performance against timeliness standards.
Secure online booking
We are able to offer our NHS clients a secure online booking facility via the NHS N3 network. Medical Services are one of the few private transport providers to have achieved the security levels needed in order to be able to qualify for NHS N3 status.
The online booking process is simple to follow and is fully auditable by using an individual’s log on and password, so every keystroke is traceable.
Eligibility Criteria Assessment Tools
Medical Services can act as your gatekeepers to ensure that your transport is only authorised and agreed to patients that meet the needs criteria.
The assessment tool takes the form of an initial screen with agreed questions that are asked of the patients requesting transport. The responses are scored on the system and if the patient has achieved a qualifying score for hospital provided transport then a booking screen is opened. Hospital staff can be trained and supported to use the system.
Major Incident Management & Support
We have an Emergency Planning Officer, who works with our clients to prepare response plans to potential incidents. A number of our senior management team have had major incident management training and completed a number of ‘emergo’ exercises and applications within and for hospital trusts.
As major incidents take many different forms, our role is to provide direct support to the trusts to allow direct response to the incident to be handled by the emergency services. Our supporting arrangements can be to facilitate increased discharge activity, increased transfers to other hospitals or care facilities, staff movement, urgent pathology or blood movement, pharmacy deliveries or replenishments.
