ScotsERVS is a medical charity, working in partnership with NHSGGC since 2011 to provide Ambulatory logistics. Our volunteer responders transport specialist medical items and personnel between hospitals and to the home/hospice. This includes retrieving time or condition-critical items such as bloods, samples for analysis, controlled pharmaceuticals, theatre & life support equipment, implants and prosthesis, surgical case notes, TPN & specialist feeds etc. Missions are urgent or emergency in nature and we support both ad-hoc and planned requests.

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Approx 90% of patient beneficiaries originate or are undergoing treatment at the RHC/QEUH campus - including the long-term community support of children with complex or life-limiting conditions. The vast majority of all our journeys for NHSGGC either start or end at the QEUH/RHC combined campus, though some patients with more complex needs may not reside geographically within the local catchment area. For some requests for specialist testing for GGC patients, the receiving hospital site may be located anywhere within Scotland or indeed the UK. For instance, Great Ormond Street, London and the Great North Children's Hospital / Newcastle RVI both provide testing facilities utilised for the diagnosis and long-term monitoring of GGC patients of which we have enabled.

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Since 2011 we been delivering hospital volunteering projects providing support to specialist GGC units, staff & patients. The service we provide enables parity of access to resources and has significant cost-saving implications for the Board, it enhances patient-care and enables more patients - who would otherwise be recalled to a hospital to be monitored and treated - to be fully supported on a daily basis in a community setting rather than be admitted to a ward. This benefit is most apparent with our current long-term usage by RHC Ward 3B, Gastroenterology/Nutrition & Aseptic pharmacy teams.

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Historically our service operated to the benefit of Scotland's sick children; and supported the 16 neonatal NICU/SCBU maternity units across Scotland around the clock from our Southern General Hospital base. In Scotland, over 50 000 babies are born each year - 11% will spend time in 1 of the 16 neonatal NICU/SCBU units around the country. But not every unit and hospital had the same parity access to resources and our charity team was founded in 2011 at Yorkhill Children’s Hospital primarily to combat this issue. Our service to date has been funded by philanthropic grants and donations, and supported by community volunteers. We have been recognised and supported in our work for the Board by National Services and by both the Scottish and Westminster Governments.

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By 2013 that scope had widened significantly to support GGC patients located across the Central belt with associated health conditions. By 2015, we routinely supported patients associated to GGC receiving care at 35-40+ NHS sites as well as supporting those local patients returning to the Community. Between 2011 and May 2016, we were fundamental in working alongside NHSGGC,the SNBTS and the Scottish Government to develop The Nationwide Donor Milk Bank (est July 2013), a resource based at the Southern General Maternity, which we championed, developed and provided the nationwide cold-chain logistics and contingencies support to. This resource we fully developed with RHC, before transitioning our efforts after May 2016 back to supporting the needs of the wider hospital base.

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As our service became more established, we began receiving an ever increasing number of requests for emergency-grade services support from other specialist units, hospitals & directorates with transportation of urgent packages and medical staff - which has spurred on our case for business expansion. Our trained volunteers have the capability to safely transport by road blood, blood products, samples, pharmaceuticals, vaccines, surgical equipment for theatre, life-support equipment, specialist feeds, medical notes and/or any other similar time or condition-critical resources on demand for the immediate support of patients. We work in collaboration with the statutory services (NHS Scotland & S.N.B.T.S) in providing the means to achieve the best level of care for NHS patients as possible, and are currently in development with those providers to provide more complementary enhancements of service to the wider community. Such as the potential for (PTS) Patient Transport Services. In 2013, we supported over 200+ preterm children alone. By 2016, we were responding to on average between 300-450+ patients per month for a variety of conditions. That number has remained consistent to date. In January 2017, the service passed the milestone of over 15,000 patient missions launched on behalf on RHC/QEUH patients.

Currently, our service provides 24 hour coverage a day from our base at QEUH Glasgow. We are specifically on call for certain directorate clients based at RHC/QEUH: such as Theatres, Paediatric Intensive Care, Neonatal Intensive Care, Integrated Care, Clinical Research, Gastroenterology, Acute Receiving, Gartnavel (Beatson) Oncology and BTS Haematology, Biochemistry & Microbiology laboratories; South Glasgow EPAS, Maternity and the Community Midwifery & Homebirth teams to name but a few. We have spare capacity throughout any 24 period which we are actively working with RHC & QEUH clinical leads to develop further to the benefit of the Board in the immediate future.

Our volunteers transport a wide variety of specialist products and staff and have the capability to transport anywhere within Scotland (and beyond as necessary) so it means our vehicles are very rarely off the road for a significant time period. We additionally provide all-weather resilience to the Board during times of high demand or adverse weather, as can be attested to our use during 2018 “Beast from the East” winter storms.

Our dedicated volunteers are always on call, ready to assist when urgent needs arise, often outside of regular working hours. Their commitment ensures that help is just a call away, providing vital support whenever it’s needed most. 

Thank you to our volunteers for their unwavering dedication and willingness to step in during critical times.