Need to know
For #TeamEEAST Last updated: 18 May 2024 at 06:57
Diane Dingley is an Unmet Needs Facilitator and has been with the Trust for over 14 years.
I joined the Trust in the patient transport service under the Addenbrookes contract, as I wanted to help people and be hands on without the clinical side. When the contract was renewed, there were new roles for ambulance care assistants with blue light driver training, so I applied to do this and completed it successfully. I then worked on the high dependency ambulance with a paramedic, transferring or transporting patients who needed clinical care on the journey. These were predominantly transfers between Addenbrookes and Papworth hospital, but also included patients needing additional care such as tracheostomy support or monitoring equipment.
For around 6 months in 2009, I had a health problem which prevented me from doing my usual role, resulting in me having around 5 months off. The Trust then found me alternative working duties within the clinical audit and governance team.
Once I had finished my alternative working duties, I decided to move into emergency clinical advice and triage (ECAT) as I wanted a new challenge and to see the service from a different perspective. I started in ECAT as an assistant in 2017 and then started my secondment as an unmet needs facilitator in 2022. Unmet Needs is a project aimed at providing a link between the 24hr emergency ambulance service and the various third sector services and organisations that can help with low acuity, non-medical, unmet needs. It provides an additional referral pathway for the problems recognised by the ambulance crews as an issue which may, if left, impact on a patient’s health and well-being, but which, historically, they have had to ignore because of the difficulty in finding help outside of normal hours. These problems can be loneliness, isolation, cost of living issue, homelessness, financial or debt advice, practical home support, carer support, the list is endless. We receive the referral and find suitable free access support and help.
A colleague and I have set up the project from scratch and there are no other services offering this in England. It has been a challenging and as it is charity funded it has an unknown future, but I love it. We are literally changing the lives of some people - the difference we are able to make with just a couple of phone calls is phenomenal. Job satisfaction has always been a big deal for me, and I get so much of it in this role.
I have faced some challenges along the way, as it did not come naturally to me to use computers. Although I had used them previously, finding I had to use multiple systems on four monitors in ECAT was very daunting at first.
I am proud to work as part of the EEAST team as there are so many wonderful people you can turn to for support, help and friendship. We all want to do the best for our patients. If you’re thinking of starting a career with the Trust, I would say to look at it as you would a boat on a river – where you get on, might not be the same place you get off. Anything is possible and the opportunities are endless if you are proactive and accept the challenges you have along the way.
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Published 28th August 2023