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Senior ambulance officers in Swedish emergency medical services: a qualitative study of perceptions and experiences of a new management role in challenging incidents.

ABSTRACT: Objectives: Increased demands are placed on emergency services and their role and ability to act in incidents in challenging environments, for example, road tunnels. Collaboration between officers from emergency services (fire brigade, police and ambulance services) is important for an effective rescue effort. In Gothenburg, Sweden, a position as a senior ambulance officer (SAO) within the emergency medical services (EMS) has been introduced to support the regular force during major incidents. The aim of this paper was to explore the perceptions and experiences of the SAO's new management role in challenging incidents, such as those occurring in road tunnels.

Design: A qualitative interview study.

Setting: The study was carried out from February to June 2019 in Gothenburg, Sweden, which is a municipality with several road tunnels and a population of approximately 580?000 people. SAOs collaborate with the corresponding function within the police and fire brigade, both having senior officers at major incident sites.

Participants: Twelve SAOs.

Methods: The study used semistructured interviews. The collected data were analysed using qualitative content analysis.

Results: According to SAOs' experience, prehospital medical management included not only leadership, but also planning, training and indepth knowledge of, for example, tunnel environments. Furthermore, SAOs adopted an encouraging and teaching role for their colleagues. SAOs' responsibilities also included proactive planning together with the fire brigade and police, which was regarded as enhancing interorganisational collaboration. An overall theme emerged which the SAOs described as 'A new holistic approach to EMS leadership and management'.

Conclusions: The participants considered that the new SAO role not only seems to improve the prehospital medical management, but also makes the EMS command structure during challenging incidents symmetrical with the fire brigade and police command structure. The implementation of national guidelines is desirable and is requested by the SAOs.

SUBMITTER: Hylander J

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7722809 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Senior ambulance officers in Swedish emergency medical services: a qualitative study of perceptions and experiences of a new management role in challenging incidents.

Hylander Johan J Saveman Britt-Inger BI Björnstig Ulf U Gyllencreutz Lina L

BMJ open 20201207 12

<h4>Objectives</h4>Increased demands are placed on emergency services and their role and ability to act in incidents in challenging environments, for example, road tunnels. Collaboration between officers from emergency services (fire brigade, police and ambulance services) is important for an effective rescue effort. In Gothenburg, Sweden, a position as a senior ambulance officer (SAO) within the emergency medical services (EMS) has been introduced to support the regular force during major incid ...[more]

PMID: 33293325

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Project description:BackgroundNHS ambulance service staff are at risk of poor physical and mental wellbeing because of the likelihood of encountering stressful and traumatic incidents. While reducing sickness absence and improving wellbeing support to ambulance staff is a key NHS priority, few studies have empirically documented a national picture to inform policy and service re-design. The study aimed to understand how ambulance service trusts in England deal with staff health and wellbeing, as well as how the staff perceive and use wellbeing services.MethodsTo achieve our aim, we undertook semi-structured telephone interviews with health and wellbeing leads and patient-facing ambulance staff, as well as undertaking documentary analysis of ambulance trust policies on wellbeing. The study was conducted both before and during the UK first COVID-19 pandemic wave. The University of Lincoln ethics committee and the Health Research Authority (HRA) granted ethical approval. Overall, we analysed 57 staff wellbeing policy documents across all Trusts. Additionally, we interviewed a Health and Wellbeing Lead in eight Trusts as well as 25 ambulance and control room staff across three Trusts.ResultsThe study highlighted clear variations between organisational and individual actions to support wellbeing across Trust policies. Wellbeing leads acknowledged real 'tensions' between individual and organisational responsibility for wellbeing. Behaviour changes around diet and exercise were perceived to have a positive effect on the overall mental health of their workforce. Wellbeing leads generally agreed that mental health was given primacy over other wellbeing initiatives. Variable experiences of health and wellbeing support were partly contingent on the levels of management support, impacted by organisational culture and service delivery challenges for staff.ConclusionAmbulance service work can impact upon physical and mental health, which necessitates effective support for staff mental health and wellbeing. Increasing the knowledge of line managers around the availability of services could improve engagement.

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Dataset Information

Senior ambulance officers in Swedish emergency medical services: a qualitative study of perceptions and experiences of a new management role in challenging incidents.

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Senior ambulance officers in Swedish emergency medical services: a qualitative study of perceptions and experiences of a new management role in challenging incidents.

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