Dr. Cathal O'Donnell:

Will the Deputy, please, let me finish? Moreover, were we to do this using a paper-based system, the lag time in having meaningful data would be significant. The solution is an electronic patient care report, which is what all modern ambulance services use and is what we aspire to use. It comprises using a tablet - perhaps similar to the one the Deputy has in front of her - with drop-down menus and data collected. This means that one can pull out the data electronically instantaneously and that patient information can arrive at the hospital even before the patient. For the past two or three years I have been pushing very hard to get this through the Estimates process, but, unfortunately, it has not yet happened. This year, for the first time, we received some revenue money towards it and we are exploring how we might implement it. Because I recognised a year ago that this would not happen any time soon, starting in the new year we will put in place an interim solution, whereby we will scan the paper-based records and use what is called optical character recognition technology to pull information from them. It is not as good as an electronic patient care report, but-----