3,200 Christmas Day calls for West Midlands Ambulance crews

The 3,241 calls they answered is 387 more than on December 25 last year, an increase of 13.5 per cent.

It followed a similarly busy Christmas Eve, when they dealt with 3,296 calls. This equates to an average of more than 137 calls every hour.

But Boxing Day and Bank Holiday Tuesday was even busier still seeing 3,699 and 3,766 calls for help respectively.

The only busier day this year was January 1 when there were 3,806 calls. That means staff are braced for another pressured day on Sunday.

Taking to Twitter to share news of their hectic shifts over Christmas, was Lucy Parrott, an ambulance dispatcher based at Millennium Point, Waterfront Business Park in Brierley Hill.

After working overnight, on Boxing Day she tweeted: "Phew! In 12 hours @OFFICIALWMAS dealt with over 1,800 jobs, that's about 150 per hour all through the night. Handed over today and off for sleep."

Inappropriate

She also highlighted how many of those who rang through should not have called the ambulance service in the first place.

"Many calls to @OFFICIALWMAS continue to be inappropriate and easily dealt with by the 111 service and other pathways. 999 is EMERGENCIES only," she tweeted.

Indeed December 26 saw the biggest year-on-year rise, jumping by 523, or 16.4 percent, when compared to the same day in 2015. Throughout the festive holiday WMAS was summoned more times than expected when taking into account the jobs they are contracted to fulfil by the Clinical Commissioning Group. On December 27, they were working 14.3 percent above contract, and on Christmas Day it was 7.1 percent higher.

If they attend more jobs than budgeted, the service gets additional money for these extra call-outs, or alternatively WMAS reimburses the CCG if there are less than forecast.

Jamie Arrowsmith, WMAS spokesman, said: "It has been an extremely busy festive period but thanks to the hard work and dedication of our staff, we have continued to provide the best possible service to the patients of the West Midlands. Many of our staff have to spend their Christmas away from their families and it is great credit to them that they continue to work so hard at this difficult time, ensuring patients receive the best level of care.

"As always, we encourage people to stop and think before dialling 999 as to whether their call is actually a life-threatening emergency."