Plymouth student first aid team helping with 999 burden

Volunteers patrol the city on bikes and on foot

Trained university students are volunteering their time to offer first aid to revellers in Plymouth.

The Plymouth Night Patrol describes itself as a "buffer" between the public and the emergency services.

Members' early intervention aimed to avoid unnecessary 999 calls and alleviate pressure on police and ambulances, organisers said.

Police said the "filtering system" offered by the group was "definitely" taking demand off officers.

The patrol was set up in 2019 and the team has helped with 152 incidents this term, many of them drink-related.

The team is equipped with tourniquets, burns and trauma dressings, a defibrillator and syringes of naloxone - a drug to help treat patients in opioid overdose.

The volunteers on bikes carry a defibrillator so they can get to emergencies quickly

Ch Supt Matt Longman, of Devon and Cornwall Police, said the scheme "leaves my officers freer to deal with the things that only they can deal with because they have particular skills or experience."

Dave Martin, founder of Plymouth Night Patrol, said: "The students put quite a big burden at night on the emergency services.

"If we can relieve that pressure - even just a little bit - then it's got to help out in the big picture and get those ambulances to the people who are really [in] life-threatening [situations]."

He added: "Quite a lot of what we do is dealing with drunk people, making sure they're safe and looked after and cared for."

The team aims to ease pressure on the emergency services

Katie-Ann Hill, a patrol volunteer, said: "My motivation is that I've been in that situation where I haven't known my limits… it's something to do to repay the community.

"We've got our first aid training, our naloxone training, and we fit as a kind of buffer between the public and the ambulance service."

Ch Supt Longman said: "I think our policing relationship with them, and the partnerships across the city, are only going to strengthen.

"What started out as a good idea, has become a really well resourced and well trained group of people.

"They really are doing some great work, they really are keeping people safe… I see us working alongside them more and more."