Our media team
Our communications team runs a media desk for enquiries from local, regional and national media.
The media desk is staffed Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm. For enquiries during these hours, please email media@eastamb.nhs.uk or call 0300 790 4051.
If we do not pick up your call, please leave a voicemail with your name, contact details, and a brief message.
Our small team handles hundreds of enquiries from journalists every year, and therefore we must prioritise our workload. We prioritise enquiries and requests based on a number of factors including: the seriousness or wider impact of an incident; the potential reputational impact; and discussions with journalists about deadlines.
Please note, we may have to liaise with other agencies on some incidents, including when a patient has died, before we can provide a response.
If an incident is attracting significant interest, we may post updates on our social media channels or website to keep the media and public informed.
What we will respond to
- Enquiries about major or significant incidents, incidents which pose a serious threat to the health of the community and incidents which lead to service disruption, e.g. large scale road traffic collisions involving multiple vehicles and casualties, terrorism, severe weather, chemical/nuclear incidents etc.
- Enquiries that may have a reputational impact on, or affect public perception of, our service.
- Requests for interviews (including for print, TV and radio), filming or feature requests.
What we won't respond to
While we appreciate some incidents may be of interest to the public, this is not the same as in the public interest. We therefore don't respond to:
- Enquiries about minor RTCs, unless there is significant disruption or other extenuating circumstances. Most RTCs we are called to are minor and do not involve serious injury or major disruption.
- Enquiries about incidents which we did not attend.
- Speculative enquiries about why ambulance crews or the air ambulance are in a certain area without other information being provided.
- Enquiries about medical emergencies at private addresses.
- Patient condition checks. These should be directed to the relevant hospital.
- Freedom of Information requests or requests for statistics. Please redirect these to FOI@eastamb.nhs.uk.
- Non-media related requests - general enquiries should be sent to feedback@eastamb.nhs.uk.
Who we will respond to
- Trained, professional, bona fide journalists working on behalf of a recognised media outlet.
- As a recognised media outlet, the organisation you work for will be regulated by a recognised code of ethics for print, online or broadcast media.
Who we won't respond to
- Regrettably, we are unable to respond to student journalists or bloggers.
The media team operates an on-call function outside of normal working hours, but it is not an extension of the media desk.
For urgent media enquiries on evenings, weekends and Bank Holidays which cannot wait until the next working day, email media@eastamb.nhs.uk or call 0300 790 4051.
If the on-call communications officer determines your enquiry warrants a response out-of-hours, we will endeavour to come back to you. If it doesn't, then you should not expect a response from us out-of-hours.
