Patient Transport Services
The Patient Transport Service (PTS) is the non-emergency transport section of the Ambulance Service of New South Wales. The role of the Patient Transport Officer (PTO) is to transport patients who require no active monitoring and whose condition is of a non-life threatening nature.
Transporting these patients allows the front line ambulance crews to be available to respond to potential life threatening medical and/or trauma incidents quicker. The introduction of the Patient Transport Service also allows for all non-emergency patients to be transported more quickly.
How to access the Patient Transport Service (PTS)
The PTS is available to patients whose condition is of a non-life threatening nature but are not well enough to travel by private or public transport. This service is available from 6am to 10pm Monday to Friday.
All requests for non-emergency transport must be authorised by a doctor. A medical authority must determine, according to the patient’s condition, whether it is appropriate for them to be transported by the PTS or emergency ambulance.
Examples of non-emergency stretcher ambulance transport include:
- Admission to hospital from home
- Discharges from hospital to home
- Inter hospital transfers
- Transports to and from nursing homes
- Transports to and from specialist and diagnostic centres
- Transfer of patients to and from Air Ambulance / airports
- Patients requiring day treatment
Training
Patient Transport Officers (PTOs) undertake a four-week inservice training program at the Ambulance Education Centre at Rozelle. On successful completion of their course PTOs are issued with Certificate 2 Pre Hospital Care qualification, which is VETAB Accredited.
PTOs are trained to the level of Ambulance First Aid (basic first aid skills) with advanced resuscitation skills. They have the ability to administer therapeutic oxygen therapy and monitor pulse and breathing rates but are not taught blood pressure, cardiac monitoring or permitted to administer any medications or manage patients on intravenous fluids. This training is designed to give PTOs the skills they require to transport non-emergency patients only and therefore they are not used as first responders to any emergency situation.
Patient Transport Vehicles
The vehicles used by the Patient Transport Service (PTS) are Ford Transit models which can accommodate two stretcher patients and two walking patients.
These vehicles have green and white striping to differentiate them from an emergency ambulance, which has red and white striping. As the PTS is designed to transport non-emergency patients these vehicles are not equipped to the same levels as an emergency ambulance.
The Patient Transport Service provides non-emergency transport for patients requiring no active monitoring and whose condition is of a non-life threatening nature. Non-emergency ambulance transport includes admissions to and discharges from hospital, inter-hospitals transfers, nursing home transports and patients requiring day treatment.