West Yorkshire Volunteer Community First Responder recognised in New Year Honours List

Roy Farmer, a Huddersfield-based volunteer community first responder (CFR) with Yorkshire Ambulance Service NHS Trust, has been recognised with a British Empire Medal (BEM) for services to the community in West Yorkshire.

Roy signed up to be a community first responder in April 2015 and is approaching ten years of volunteering in his local area. During that time, he has clocked up over 11,000 hours and attended over 3,500 incidents, including 38 cardiac arrests where he has achieved 15 ROSCs (return of spontaneous circulation).

Roy said: “I thoroughly enjoy being able to volunteer and provide immediate support to patients and reassurance to their families prior to an ambulance arriving on scene. It means that I can give something back to my local community and I feel incredibly proud to have been recognised in the New Year Honours List.”

John Spikings, Community Defibrillation Officer at Yorkshire Ambulance Service NHS Trust and coordinator of the West Yorkshire schemes, said: “Roy is such a worthy recipient of the British Empire Medal. He has served his community well and has always supported the Community Resilience Team in helping to test and develop additional elements of responding such as care for those who have fallen and blood sugar testing.

“Our volunteers are based within their local communities and may only be a minute or two away from a medical emergency.  Very often their role is to simply provide valuable reassurance to patients and their families until the ambulance crew arrives. However, in some cases, such as a cardiac arrest, they can perform CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) and use an automated external defibrillator to try and restart someone’s heart in those vital first few minutes. If effective treatment can be given within those first minutes, lives can be saved.

“CFRs come from all walks of life and volunteer for a variety of reasons. Many people find it rewarding to help people in need and give something back, while others benefit from learning new skills, meeting new people and becoming more connected with their local community.”

Full training is given to successful applicants who need to be over 18, physically fit and hold a full driving licence, having never been banned from driving with no more than three penalty points.  Yorkshire Ambulance Service also runs Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks on candidates. We ask volunteers to be on call for an average of five hours a week, although depending on the size of the scheme, this can be flexible.

For more information about the role and how to apply, visit https://www.yas.nhs.uk/get-involved