Seán Kyne (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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16. To ask the Minister for Health his plans to increase the number of first responders in communities, particularly in rural communities; if he will provide details of the work ongoing to improve ambulance response rates, particularly in north west Connemara, County Galway; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [7979/15]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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Additional funding of €5.4m has been provided to the National Ambulance Service in 2015 to address service gaps, particularly in the West, by reforming rostering and staffing additional stations. In this regard, 50 paramedic posts have been allocated to East Galway and Mayo. It is also intended to expand the number of community first response teams, particularly in more rural and sparsely populated areas, to add to the more than 100 teams already operating around the country.

In addition, the Emergency Aeromedical Support Service, which is specifically targeted at the West, will continue to provide rapid access to appropriate treatment for very high acuity patients where this might be difficult to achieve by road.

The Deputy may wish to note that response time performance is improving in the face of increasing demands on the service. The latest available data shows that nationally, in December 2014, the volume of ECHO calls rose by 7% compared to the same period in 2013, and DELTA calls by 11%. Despite this, an ambulance arrived within the target time for 78% of ECHO calls and for 64% of DELTA calls - an improvement of 9% and 4.6%, respectively, on the same period in 2013. Of course response time targets only measure one aspect of ambulance performance. Internationally, many services are moving to patient outcomes as a better indicator of performance. The National Ambulance Service has therefore introduced a patient outcome target for out-of-hospital cardiac arrests in 2014, and more are being developed.

HIQA recently published its review of ambulance services. In addition, the national capacity review and the review of Dublin ambulance service are expected to be finalised shortly. These three reviews, when taken together, will provide us with very good information which will help drive further service improvement. I have therefore asked the HSE to prepare an action plan on completion of the three reviews, with timelines to realise a new vision for our ambulance services.