Glossary

Term	Acronym	Definition
Accident and emergency	A&E	A medical treatment facility specialising in acute care of patients who present without prior appointment, either by their own means or by ambulance. The emergency department is usually found in a hospital or other primary care centre.
Ace Anglia	-	A user-led advocacy organisation and registered charity working with people with learning disabilities across Suffolk.
Alert, Voice, Pain, Unresponsive	AVPU	A system to measure and record a patient’s level of consciousness.
Ambulance (clinical) quality indicators	ACQIs	A set of national measures to benchmark clinical quality against eleven indicators to improve quality and safety of patient care.
Ambulance operations Centre	AOC	Control centre for managing call receipt, triage and dispatch functions.
Association of Ambulance Chief Executives	AACE	A central organisation that supports, coordinates and implements nationally agreed policy.
Blood pressure	BP	The pressure exerted by circulating blood upon the walls of blood vessels. One of the principal vital signs.
British Association for Immediate Care	BASICS	A charitable organisation who works in partnership with EEAST.
Cardiopulmonary resuscitation	CPR	An emergency procedure, performed in an effort to manually preserve intact brain function until further measures are taken to restore spontaneous blood circulation and breathing in a person in cardiac arrest.
Care Quality Commission	CQC	The independent watchdog for healthcare in England. It assesses and reports on the quality and safety of services provided by the NHS and the independent healthcare sector, and works to improve services for patients and the public.
Category 1	Cat 1 / C1	National response time standard for 999 immediately life-threatening injuries and illnesses.
Category 1T	Cat 1T / C1T	National response time standard for 999 immediately life-threatening injuries and illnesses where the patient is transported.
Category 2	Cat 2 / C2	National response time standard for 999 emergency calls.
Category 3	Cat 3 / C3	National response time standard for urgent calls and in some instances where patients may be treated in-situ (e.g., their own home) or referred to a different pathway of care.
Category 4	Cat 4T / C4T	National response time standard for less urgent calls. In some instances, patients may be given advice over the phone or referred to another service such as a GP or pharmacist.
Chief Executive Officer	CEO	The position of the most senior officer, executive, or administrator in charge of managing an organisation.
Clinical Audit	-	A process for measuring the level of care given against a set of standards to drive improvement.
Practice Group	CBPG	A group within EEAST that has responsibility for identifying and monitoring best clinical practice.
Clinical commissioning group	CCG	NHS organisations set up as a result of the Health and Social Care Act 2012 to organise the delivery of NHS services in England.
College of Paramedics	-	The recognised professional body for all paramedics in the UK, whose role is to promote and develop the paramedic profession across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Commissioning	-	The processes which local authorities and clinical commissioning groups undertake to make sure that services funded by them meet the needs of the patient.
Commissioning for Quality and Innovation programme	CQuIN	The incorporation of quality metrics within quality and innovation three-year contracts. Full reimbursement of activity is made upon delivery of quality initiatives.
Community Engagement Group	CEG	A group within EEAST in place to ensure that views of patients and their representatives can be used to improve our services.
Community First Responder(s)	CFR(s)	Teams of volunteers who are trained by the ambulance service to a nationally recognised level and provide lifesaving treatment to people in their communities.
Compassionate Conversation	-	EEAST’s appraisal process for staff.
Computer Aided Dispatch	CAD	Computer software used to record all patient system calls and patient activity.
Data Protection Act	DPA	United Kingdom Act of Parliament which updates data protection laws in the UK.
Data Security Protection Toolkit	DSPT	An online system which allows NHS organisations and partners to assess themselves against NHS Digital information standards.
Department of Health and Social Care	DHSC	A department of the Government with responsibility for government policy for health and social care matters and for the NHS in England along with a few elements of the same matters which are not otherwise devolved to the Scottish, Welsh or Northern Irish governments.
Disclosure Log	-	Summary of information that a public organisation has released following a request made under the Freedom of Information Act.
Duty of Candour	DoC	Regulation 20 of the Health and Social Care Act 2012 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014 to ensure that providers are open and transparent with people who use services or their representatives.
East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust	EEAST	Ambulance service which operates in the east of England.
Easyread	-	An accessible format which can be used by people with learning difficulties.
Electrocardiography	ECG	An ECG is a test used to measure the electrical activity of the heart.
Electronic patient care record	ePCR	A patient care record which is in electronic format.
Face, Arm, Speech, Time	FAST	A simple test to help people recognise the signs of stroke and understand the importance of emergency treatment.
Freedom to Speak Up	FTSU	A national initiative to apply measures to enable staff to speak out about patient safety and other concerns confidentially or anonymously.
General practitioner	GP	A medical practitioner who treats acute and chronic illnesses and provides preventive care and health education to patients.
Glasgow Coma Scale	GCS	A clinical scale used to reliably measure a person's level of consciousness.
Global Rostering System	GRS	An electronic system that EEAST uses to plan resources.
Glyceryl trinitrate	GTN	Drug for heart disease patients to dilate the blood vessels. Delivered as a spray or in tablet form.
Hazardous Area Response Team	HART	Specialist ambulance unit that provides medical care to patients in hazardous or ‘hot’ environments. They utilise special vehicles and equipment.
Health and Care Professionals Council	HCPC	Regulatory body for state registered paramedics.
Health and Social Care Act	HSCA	An Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It provides for the most extensive reorganisation of the structure of the National Health Service in England to date. It removed responsibility for the health of citizens from the Secretary of State for Health, which the post had carried since the inception of the NHS in 1948.
Health overview and scrutiny committee	HOSC	Provides external assessment of any NHS consultation process giving local assurance that the business cases for any future NHS developments are robust.
Healthcare Quality Improvement Partnership	HQIP	An independent organisation to promote quality in healthcare, and in particular to increase the impact that clinical audit has on healthcare quality improvement.
Healthwatch	-	An independent national body with the power to monitor the NHS and to refer patients’ concerns to a wide range of authorities. It represents the interests of patients as consumers, strategic commissioning, pursues and refers patient complaints and contributes to national public debate on the NHS.
Hear and treat	-	Over-the-telephone advice that callers who do not have serious or life-threatening conditions receive from an ambulance service after calling 999.
Information Governance Group	ICG	A group within EEAST in place to ensure that all information systems and processes comply with the Data Protection Act.
Integrated Care System	ICS	Partnerships between the organisations that meet health and care needs across an area, to coordinate services and to plan in a way that improves population health and reduces inequalities between different groups.
Integrated Performance Report	IPR	Dashboard used within EEAST that provides information against set key metrics.
Key Line of Enquiry	KLOE	Five key questions, which CQC inspectors use to help establish whether a service is providing the high standard of care expected of them.
Key performance indicator	KPI	Clear, comparative gauge for CCGs, boards, local authorities, patients and the public to monitor about the quality of health services commissioned by CCGs and the associated health outcomes.
Learning from Deaths	LfD	National guidance for NHS trusts on working with bereaved families and carers. It advises trusts on how they should support, communicate and engage with families following a death of someone in their care.
Local authority	-	An organisation that is officially responsible for all the public services and facilities in a particular area.
Metrics	-	Set of ways of quantitatively and periodically measuring performance.
Mobile Stroke Unit	MSU	An ambulance equipped with a scanner and other diagnostic tools to enable the rapid diagnosis and treatment of a stroke prior to taking the patient to hospital.
Myocardial infarction	MI	Clinical term for a heart attack.
National Early Warning Score	NEWS2	A simple aggregate scoring system in which a score is allocated to physiological measurements.
National Guardian’s Office	NGO	The organisation who works to make speaking up become business as usual to effect cultural change in the NHS.
National Health Service	NHS	The publicly funded healthcare system of England. It is the largest and the oldest single-payer healthcare system in the world.
National Institute for Health and Care Excellence	NIHR	Organisation that funds health and care research in the United Kingdom.
National Patient Safety Alert	NPSA	Issued by NHS Improvement to rapidly warn the healthcare system of risks.
National Reporting and Learning Service	NRLS	A central database of patient safety incident reports.
National staff survey	-	A way of ensuring that the views of staff working in the NHS inform local improvements and input in to local and national assessments of quality, safety, and delivery of the NHS Constitution.
NHS Digital	NHSD	The national information and technology partner to the health and care system.
NHS England and NHS Improvement	NHSE&I	The lead body for the National Health Service in England.
NHS Long-Term Plan	-	A 10-year plan published by the NHS which provides its commitment to improve the health, levels of care and outcomes those living in the UK and how it will achieve these improvements.
Outcome from out-of­Hospital Cardiac Arrest	OHCA	A prospective study, collecting information on all out-of-hospital cardiac arrests in the UK.
Oxygen saturation	SpO2	Term referring to the fraction of oxygen within the haemoglobin levels. A normal level would range between 95-97%.
Pandemic	-	A disease that exists in almost all of an area or in almost all of a group of people.
Paramedic	-	A registered healthcare professional, working predominantly in the pre-hospital and out-of-hospital environment.
Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman	PHSO	A legal organisation who make final decisions on complaints that have not been resolved by the NHS in England and UK government departments and other UK public organisations.
Patient Advice and Liaisons Service	PALS	PALS queries are processed by the Patient Services team who are the first point of contact for enquiries from the public or other healthcare organisations.
Patient care record	PCR	All NHS providers are required to record the care given to a patient on a patient care record.
Patient Facing Staff Hours	PFSH	A term used to describe resources available for patient care.
Patient Safety and Experience Group	PSEG	A group within EEAST in place to ensure that incidents and patient feedback are used to reduce risks and improve our services and patients’ experiences.
Patient safety incident	PSI	Any unintended or unexpected incident which could have (or did) lead to harm for one or more patients receiving NHS care.
Patient Safety Incident Response Framework	PSIRF	An NHS process to further improve patient safety.
Patient transport service	PTS	Provides transport to and from premises providing NHS healthcare and between NHS healthcare providers. This is also known as scheduled transport or non-emergency service.
Payment by results	-	The payment system in England under which commissioners pay healthcare providers for each patient seen or treated, taking into account the complexity of the patient’s healthcare needs.
Primary care	-	Out-of-hospital health services that play a central role in the local community.
Primary percutaneous coronary intervention	PPCI	Commonly known as coronary angioplasty or simply angioplasty, is a therapeutic procedure to treat the narrowed coronary arteries of the heart found in coronary heart disease.
Public Health England	PHE	An executive agency of the Department of Health and Social Care that exists to protect and improve the nation’s health and wellbeing.
Quality Governance Committee	QCG	An EEAST committee which has authority from the Trust Board to be assured that progress is being made on the assurance processes for clinical effectiveness, patient safety and patient experience.
Quarter 1 (2,3,4)	Q1 (2,3,4)	Financial year (1st April – 31st March) quarter indicator.
Quick Response (code)	QR Code	A type of barcode that contains a matrix of dots that can be scanned using a QR scanner or a smartphone with built-in camera.
Research Ethics Committee	REC	Responsible for the ethical conduct of research studies designed to increase understanding of workplace factors that contribute to ill-health and workplace accidents.
Return of spontaneous circulation	ROSC	The resumption of sustained perfusing cardiac activity associated with significant respiratory effort after cardiac arrest.
Royal National Institute of Blind People	RNIB	One of the UK’s leading sight loss charities and the largest community of blind and partially sighted people.
Scheduled transport service	SIS	A non-emergency service provided to patients who are unable to convey themselves for outpatients’ appointments. This is also sometimes known as Patient Transport Service or non-­emergency service.
See and treat	-	Patients who are treated at home by ambulance staff and do not require taking to a hospital or other care centre.
Sepsis	-	A life-threatening condition that arises when the body’s response to an infection injures its own tissues and organs. Sepsis leads to shock, multiple organ failure and death especially if not recognised early and treated promptly.
Serious Incident	SI	An event or circumstance that could have resulted, or did result, in unnecessary damage, loss or harm such as physical or mental injury to a patient, staff, visitors or members of the public.
Service user	-	Anyone who uses, requests, applies for or benefits from health or local authority services.
Single Point of Contact	SPoC	A department within EEAST that manages clinician’s incident concerns and referrals through to the appropriate agency.
Social Worker	-	A registered professional who supports adults, children, families and communities to improve their lives.
Special Educational Need and/or Disability	SEND	A term used if a child or young person has a significantly greater difficulty in learning that the majority of others of the same age or has a disability which prevents or hinders them from making use of educational facilities of a kind generally provided for others of the same age in mainstream schools or mainstream post-16 institutions.
Stakeholders	-	Anyone with an interest in the way services are delivered including service users, carers, patients, service providers, staff, health professionals and partner organisations, councils and other community or voluntary groups.
Standard Operating Procedure	SOP	EEAST term for a process for staff to follow.
ST-elevation myocardial infarction	STEMI	A heart attack recognised by characteristics on an ECG.
STEMI care bundle	-	A set of interventions that when used together significantly improve patient outcomes for a heart attack.
Strategy	-	A plan of action designed to achieve a long-term or overall aim.
Stroke	TIA	A stroke happens when the blood supply to the brain is disturbed.
Stroke diagnostic bundle	SCB	A set of assessments that when applied provide information indicating as to whether a stroke has occurred.
Summary Care Record	SCR	An electronic record of important patient information, created from GP medical records which can be seen and used by authorised staff in other areas of the health and care system involved in the patient's direct care.
Tranexamic Acid	TXA	A medication used to treat or prevent excessive blood loss.
United Kingdom	UK	The United Kingdom is the official name for the country consisting of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
Utstein	-	The Utstein Style is a set of guidelines for uniform reporting of cardiac arrest. The Utstein Style was first proposed for emergency medical services in 1991.

 

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