THE North West ambulance service (NWAS) has handed out almost 200,000 leaflets to people using its Patient Transport Service (PTS) across the last 20 months.

A campaign to share extra information about wellbeing and health services with PTS users was launched in October 2017.

The transport service makes over 1.5 million journeys each year, so an opportunity was spotted to make use of the time that patients are in transit.

The scheme involved collaborations with Age UK and the Mental Health Foundation to provide information about boosting mental wellbeing, as well as living healthily and happily for longer.

Additionally, PTS crews supported ten different health partners to spread the word about local initiatives, including a new Urgent Treatment Centre in St Helens, the launch of a wellbeing directory in Fylde and Wyre, and a joint partnership with the Greater Manchester Health and Social Care Partnership to distribute 6,000 winter wellbeing booklets across Greater Manchester.

Nathan Hearn, PTS contract delivery manager, said: “The nature of our service means we spend time with many different patients every day. We recognised we could make even better use of that time by helping to share important health messages and information about locally available services.

“Thanks to this initiative to transform patient care, PTS patients now have access to more information about health issues and local services.

“NWAS will continue to provide health advice and information to share with patients so they are supported to stay well.”

The health leaflet scheme was part of the NWAS ‘Transforming Patient Care’ programme, which has included a number of developments to improve patient care by supporting them as early on in their NHS experience as possible.

Visit www.nwas.nhs.uk for more information.