London Ambulance Service

The London Ambulance Service (LAS) is an National Health Service trust that is responsible for answering and responding to medical emergencies within London, such as 999 emergency response and getting help to those who need it as quickly as possible.

It is one of the busiest ambulance services in the world, and the busiest in the United Kingdom, providing care to more than 8.6 million people, who live and work in London. The service is currently under the leadership of chief executive Dr Fionna Moore MBE. The service employ around 4,500 staff.

Once a 999 call has been received by the LAS Emergency Operations Centre (EOC), the service will either resolve the call over the telephone or dispatch a front line or A&E support ambulance, fast response car (FRU), motorcycle response unit (MRU), cycle response unit (CRU) or the Helicopter Emergency Medical Service (HEMS - operating a helicopter, trauma response car and physician response unit), all depending on the nature of the emergency. In exceptional cases, or where the service deems in necessary, specialist teams can be deployed from within the service, such as the Hazardous Area Response Team (HART) and Specialist Operations. These teams are specially trained and equipped to deal with incidents such as working at height or in confined spaces.

It is one of 10 ambulance trusts in England providing emergency medical services, and is part of the National Health Service, receiving direct government funding for its role. There is no charge to patients for use of the service, as every person in England has the right to the attendance of an ambulance in an emergency.

The LAS responded to over 1.8 million calls for assistance, and over 1 million incidents in 2015/16. Incidents rose by 20,000 in 2015/16, putting more pressure on the service. All 999 calls from the public are answered at the Emergency Operations Centre (EOC) in Waterloo, which then dispatches and allocates the appropriate resources. To assist, the service's command and control system is linked electronically with the equivalent system for London's Metropolitan Police. This means that police updates regarding specific jobs will be updated directly on the computer-aided dispatch (CAD) log, to be viewed by the EOC, and the resources allocated to the job.

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