Dr Zahid Asghar and Prof Niro Siriwardena attended the fourth European Emergency Medical Service Congress (EMS2019) which took place in Madrid from Friday to Sunday 24-26 April 2019. The theme of this year’s conference was, “It takes a system to save a life – patients first’. The congress provided an opportunity for leading clinicians, scientists and managers in EMS to share their research.
Prof Siriwardena gave an oral presentation on, ‘Predictors and outcomes of ambulance calls to diabetes-related emergencies in care homes – retrospective observational database study’ which was one the fifty best abstracts.
This was a study funded by NIHR CLAHRC East Midlands with co-investigators, Prof Graham Law, Dr Murray D. 
Smith, Dr Mohammad Iqbal, Viet-Hai Phung, Ann Spaight, Amanda Brewster Pauline Mountain, Keith Spurr, Prof Mo Ray, Dr Iskandar Idris and Prof Kamlesh Khunti from the University of Lincoln, East Midlands Ambulance Service NHS Trust, the Healthier Ageing Patient and Public Involvement Group at the University of Lincoln, Diabetes UK Midlands, University of Nottingham and University of Leicester. The study concluded that conveyance rates for people with diabetes-related emergencies similar for patients in care homes compared with community dwellers after taking into account other factors despite access to trained staff. This could be partly due to higher rates of comorbidity or frailty in care home patients. It was proposed that improved training and pathways might reduce conveyance in care home patients enabling safe care in usual environment.
Dr Asghar presented a poster on ‘Predictors of hospitalisation in people presenting with convulsions to ambulance services: cross sectional study using linked ambulance and hospital data’ which also included Anne Spaight, DR Phil Miller, Dr Frank Coffey, Dr Jon Dickson and Prof Niro Siriwardena, of the University of Lincoln, East Midlands Ambulance Service NHS Trust, Queen’s Medical Centre Nottingham and the University of Sheffield. The cross sectional study, which used a dataset combining ambulance records and routine Hospital Episode Statistics found that most patients with convulsions attended by an ambulance were not hospitalised. Male patients were more likely to be admitted and older patients with greater physiological disturbance were more likely to receive intensive care.
There were a number of excellent keynotes, oral presentations and posters with the final day involving a recreation of a mass emergency incident involving the audience, simulated casualties and input from the Madrid Emergency Medical Services.
By Prof Siriwardena