THE Deputy Health Minister visited Newport’s Royal Gwent Hospital this morning after it was revealed Aneurin Bevan Health Board is trialling new measures to respond to non-emergency 999 calls.

The Gwent health board is the first in Wales to introduce a scheme where specialist doctors are sent out with ambulances in response to more minor 999 calls.

The Welsh Ambulance Service also revealed there are now five on-hand clinicians at its control centre in Cwmbran to help “sieve out” non-serious emergency calls.

The measures come as figures released by the Welsh Government show 31,000 emergency ambulance calls last year were made for minor incidents, while only three calls needed hospital treatment.

Vaughan Gething AM was given a tour of the A&E department at Royal Gwent where he spoke to hospital staff and members of Aneurin Bevan Health Board and the Ambulance Trust. He then visited the Welsh Ambulance Service’s Cwmbran base.

Mr Gething said: “We can all make a difference as individuals. It’s about using all parts of the NHS, the ambulance should not be the first port of call. It’s not an alternative to the NHS Out of Hours service.”

The AM said every emergency ambulance sent out costs the Welsh Ambulance Service £238, and minor incident calls divert resources away from the most life-threatening incidents.

Andrew Jenkins, deputy director of clinical services at the Welsh Ambulance Trust, said: “There is a growing inappropriate use of our 999 resources. We have got these calls coming in and they are tying up the lines.

“But what we have done, we have put clinicians in our control centre so they can offer extra advice to further sieve out those calls. We are hoping to expand that workforce.

“Some of the calls are ridiculous; calls about batteries lost in the remote control or that someone has eaten some of the dog’s food.

Dr Tim Rogerson, consultant of emergency medicine at the Royal Gwent, said the problem is not with the A&E department, which itself is seeing patients on time.

“Our problem is that the hospital is at full capacity. The hospital is filling up so we cannot move patients on.

“But there are patients who need to think about how they access healthcare. Some people come in with minor cuts and injuries and these people could have made their own way here.

“We are under a huge amount of pressure. We do have an excellent team of doctors and nurses who are working as hard as they can.”