50 paramedics shadowed the Community Independence Service’s (CIS) staff over the past month, in a collaboration aimed at providing alternative care to patients who might otherwise be taken to hospital unnecessarily.

The Alternative Care Pathway was developed by North West London Collaboration of Clinical Commissioning Groups (NWCCGS), the London Ambulance Service (LAS), and North West London Intermediate Care providers, and instead proposes that patients - for some conditions - are referred to services like CIS’s Rapid Response Team, if this is appropriate. This means that patients don’t go to hospital, unless they need to and are supported at home.