Andy joined the ambulance service in 1995 as a Trainee Technician and qualified as a paramedic in 1997. He was on the original cohort of paramedics at EAAA starting in May 2001 and stayed until November 2008 when he left to take a promotion and become a Leading Operations Manager in the ambulance service.
In 2019 Andy undertook a six-month secondment at Essex and Herts Air Ambulance as he missed working on HEMS missions. “Upon completion of this I was invited back to EAAA to cover a colleague’s maternity leave. I applied for a formal secondment in 2022 and have remained here ever since!
Andy is really interested in the human factors of PHEM/HEMS, especially effective communication and working well under pressure. He enjoys working alongside ambulance service colleagues and “empowering them to do things that they may not otherwise feel comfortable in doing and generally helping them grow in their role.”
He says that the hard work and generosity of the public has enabled EAAA to grow into a class-leading air ambulance charity that is pushing boundaries in the field of pre-hospital emergency medicine: “We are blessed to work as part of an amazing team with access to great facilities and equipment that enables us to provide gold standard care to the population we serve.”
After attending a patient that was suffering life-threatening chest injuries in Thetford Forest as a result of a motorbike incident, Andy learned to ride a motorbike: “We are now good friends and even go on biking holidays to Europe together!”