Scotland’s Charity Air Ambulance (SCAA) took to the air a record number of times in 2023 as demand on the life-saving service continues to grow.
The charity’s two helicopter air ambulances – based at Perth and Aberdeen – took to the air 718 times in response to serious illness and injury throughout Scotland, marking a 3% increase on the previous year.
In addition to providing vital air support, SCAA deployed paramedics a further 230 times using their Rapid Response Vehicles to attend incidents close to their bases.
While trauma emergencies continue to dominate the workload, last year’s statistics revealed a sharp increase in stroke related emergencies.
Compared to 2022, the number of responses to such emergencies rose by a significant 63% - a surge that SCAA paramedics believe results partly from targeted campaigns and increased public awareness of the life-threatening condition.
SCAA Helimed 79 paramedic Keir Lynch highlighted a recent major public health campaign in stroke recognition, which included a hard-hitting TV advert.
“This showed the public in graphic detail how to recognise when someone is suffering a stroke,” he said. “It showed in relatable terms what happens to someone in this situation and why fast action is critical.”
With more people now able to identify what is happening to their friend, colleague or loved one, the 999 system passes that information on to their responders – including SCCA’s Perth and Aberdeen based crews.
“Speedy responses to stroke patients are vital,” explained Keir. “They are time-critical emergencies and that’s where air ambulances come into their own – especially in remote and rural locations.”
Strokes can afflict people anywhere at any time and SCAA is regularly called to fly fast, professional medical care to all corners of the country and out to Scotland’s many island communities. And the sooner a stroke is detected, the better the outcome and recovery can be.
“With strokes, it really is a case of every second counts, so we are well aware our response can make a real difference to the survival or level of recovery of our patient,” added Keir. “If the alarm is raised quickly and we can get there as fast as possible, patients’ chances are greatly enhanced.”
Keir also believes the number of transfers SCAA carries out to race stroke patients from rural hospital to their nearest thrombectomy centre has driven up statistics.
Throughout 2023, SCAA was called to 62 stroke emergencies. While that represented a marked increase on previous years and mirrored a rise in calls involving all Scottish Ambulance Service responses nationwide, SCAA also recorded an increase in cardiac-related missions.
As with strokes, these time-critical emergencies rely on rapid responders such as SCAA to give patients the best possible chance of survival and recovery.
“SCAA is deployed because we bring what is known as a 3RU response,” explained Keir.
“This is a clinician who is trained to manage a cardiac arrest situation and ensure all the procedures are carried out as well as providing clinical leadership and delivery of the automated CPR device as well as speedy airlift to the nearest cardiac centre.”
Bystander CPR and rural-based public defibrillators have played a key part in sustaining and saving lives in remote areas and, again, public recognition of the symptoms of heart attacks has increased through campaigns and education.
“SCAA can get there quickly and get a patient airlifted to hospital in the fastest possible time,” said Keir, “but the more educated the public is in that initial procedure can help enormously.”
SCAA responded by both helicopter and their Rapid Response Vehicles to 200 cardiac related emergencies in 2023 – an increase of nine per cent on the previous year.
