Pre-Hospital Care Podcast

In this special Pre-Hospital Care Podcast tactical medicine compilation, we explore the clinical, operational and human challenges of providing care in high-risk and austere environments.
Steve Woods examines the management of ballistic trauma, including whole blood administration, pleural drainage and recognising injury patterns, before discussing an equally important topic: clinician self-care and resilience.
We then turn to Eric Acevedo, who explores conflict negotiation and de-escalation techniques. From hostage and conflict situations to everyday pre-hospital encounters, these skills can help clinicians build rapport, reduce confrontation and work with patients who may be reluctant to accept treatment or attend hospital despite significant illness or injury.
A compilation exploring the reality that tactical medicine isn't just about procedures and equipment, it's about clinical judgement, communication, resilience and making good decisions under pressure.

🎙️ EMS2027 – European EMS Congress
The Pre-Hospital Care Podcast is heading to Ireland!
I’m excited to announce that I’ll be in Killarney in April 2027 as the official podcast host for EMS2027, the European EMS Congress.
📅 13–15 April 2027
📍 The Gleneagle, Killarney, Ireland
🎯 Theme: “Connecting Care Across Communities”
EMS2027 will bring together clinicians, researchers, educators and leaders from across Europe and beyond to explore the future of EMS, with a programme covering innovation, technology, sustainability, human factors, research and the future of integrated emergency care.
I’ll be there with the Pre-Hospital Care Podcast, bringing you interviews and conversations with speakers, clinicians, researchers and EMS leaders — capturing the ideas, experiences and discussions shaping contemporary pre-hospital care.
If you work in EMS, emergency medicine, pre-hospital care or healthcare, make sure you have 13–15 April 2027 in your diary.
I’ll see you in Killarney!
Find out more and register with EMS Europe – EMS2027.

🎙️ GWAAC Symposium 2026 – Innovation in Pre-Hospital Care, hosted by the Great Western Air Ambulance Charity (GWAAC).
📅 Friday 16 October 2026
📍 Pravha Lounge, Ashton Gate Stadium, Bristol
🎯 Theme: Innovation
The symposium will bring together leading clinicians, practitioners and experts to explore innovation and the future of pre-hospital care, with six expert speakers sharing their experience and perspectives.
If you work in pre-hospital care, emergency medicine, critical care or the wider healthcare community, this is an event not to miss. Sign up here.

Few presentations generate more uncertainty, anxiety, and clinical challenge than the febrile child. Every day, paramedics, emergency clinicians and critical care teams are faced with one of the most difficult questions in medicine: is this simply a self-limiting viral illness, or the early stages of a life-threatening condition?
The challenge lies not in recognising the obviously sick child, but in identifying the child who still appears relatively well while quietly deteriorating. It demands an understanding of paediatric physiology, pattern recognition, clinical judgement and the ability to make decisions with incomplete information.
Joining us is Professor Damian Roland, Professor of Paediatric Emergency Medicine at the University of Leicester and Honorary Consultant at University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust. An internationally recognised researcher and educator, he has dedicated his career to improving the assessment, recognition and management of acutely unwell children.
Together we'll discuss recognising serious illness, avoiding common diagnostic pitfalls, balancing sepsis screening with sound clinical reasoning, and why conditions such as Kawasaki disease, meningococcal disease and others must remain on every clinician's differential diagnosis.
We also explore the challenge of recognising clinical deterioration in children outside hospital, including emerging work on developing a consensus-based definition of paediatric out-of-hospital clinical deterioration.
📄 Further reading: Consensus-based definition of paediatric out-of-hospital clinical deterioration: a modified Delphi study
Read the research paper on ResearchGate

GWAAC Symposium 2026
The Great Western Air Ambulance Charity (GWAAC) Symposium takes place on Friday 16 October 2026 at the Pravha Lounge, Ashton Gate Stadium, Bristol. This year’s theme is Innovation, with six expert speakers exploring developments in pre-hospital emergency medicine, team performance and clinical practice. The event offers a day of learning, discussion and networking for those working in pre-hospital and emergency care.
Find out more and book your place: GWAAC Symposium 2026

In this episode, Deb Swann and Roger Alcock take us behind the scenes of humanitarian medicine, sharing their experiences of working in two very different global health emergencies: the 2023 Türkiye–Syria earthquake response and the 2014–2016 West African Ebola outbreak.
On 6 February 2023, a series of devastating earthquakes struck southern Türkiye and northern Syria. More than 59,000 people were killed, including over 53,500 in Türkiye and around 5,900 in Syria. The humanitarian medical response involved emergency trauma care, field hospitals, medical evacuations and international Emergency Medical Teams. Within the first year, 38 national and international Emergency Medical Teams from more than 25 countries carried out almost 100,000 medical consultations in Türkiye.
The episode also looks back at the West African Ebola crisis of 2014–2016: The largest Ebola outbreak since the virus was discovered in 1976. Beginning in Guinea and spreading to Liberia and Sierra Leone, the outbreak ultimately infected more than 28,600 people and caused 11,325 deaths. WHO declared it a Public Health Emergency of International Concern in August 2014.
Deb and Roger discuss what it is like to work in these extraordinary circumstances, the challenges of providing healthcare when normal systems have been overwhelmed, and the human experiences that stay with medical teams long after they return home.
In this episode:
Humanitarian medicine in the aftermath of the 6 February 2023 earthquake
The international medical response in TürkiyeWorking during the 2014–2016 Ebola outbreak
The realities of working on the humanitarian frontlineThe personal experiences and human stories behind the statistics
What these crises can teach us about emergency medical response

NEAS Specialist Capabilities Conference 2026
The North East Ambulance Service Specialist Capabilities Conference 2026 takes place on 3 November 2026 at The Glasshouse International Centre for Music, NewcastleGateshead.
Under the theme “Collaborate, Innovate, Excel,” the conference brings together professionals working across specialist emergency care, with sessions covering Emergency Preparedness, Resilience and Response (EPRR), critical care and HART.
The keynote speaker is Adam Desmond, the 7/7 Kings Cross paramedic, who will deliver a no-holds-barred talk on human factors and bandwidth saturation during major incidents.
Other speakers include Lee Thompson, who will discuss regional critical care, alongside specialists from EPRR and HART. Dräger supports the conference and focuses on collaboration, innovation, excellence, resilience and the communities we serve.
The closing date to register your interest is 11 October 2026.
👉 Register your interest for NEAS Specialist Capabilities Conference 2026
Date: 3 November 2026
Venue: The Glasshouse International Centre for Music, Newcastle, Gateshead

In pre-hospital care, we spend a great deal of time preparing for the moments that matter most: cardiac arrest, major trauma, difficult airways, and emotionally challenging conversations. We train, rehearse, and work hard to achieve technical excellence. But what happens after the event may be just as important as what happens during it.
Debriefing is a familiar concept in healthcare. We often think of it as a chance to review what happened, identify what went well, and consider what we could do differently next time. But for some of the world’s highest-performing teams, debriefing is much more than a learning exercise. It is a fundamental part of how they operate.
Few organisations demonstrate this better than the Blue Angels. Their debriefing culture is immediate, structured, honest, and uncompromising. Every action can be examined, every assumption challenged, and every team member is expected to contribute. The goal is not to assign blame but to understand performance, learn quickly, and get better.
So, what can healthcare learn from a team where the margin for error is measured in milliseconds? To explore that question, David and I are joined by John Hiltz, who brings firsthand experience of the Blue Angels’ debriefing culture, leadership, and approach to developing high-performing teams. John offers a unique perspective on what exceptional teams do differently, and how the principles of aviation debriefing could help pre-hospital teams build greater trust, accountability, learning, and performance.
In this episode, we explore whether debriefing is simply a tool for learning from what has already happened or one of the most powerful mechanisms we have for building better teams.

NEAS Specialist Capabilities Conference 2026
The North East Ambulance Service Specialist Capabilities Conference 2026 takes place on 3 November 2026 at The Glasshouse International Centre for Music, NewcastleGateshead.
Under the theme “Collaborate, Innovate, Excel,” the conference brings together professionals working across specialist emergency care, with sessions covering Emergency Preparedness, Resilience and Response (EPRR), critical care and HART.
The keynote speaker is Adam Desmond, the 7/7 Kings Cross paramedic, who will deliver a no-holds-barred talk on human factors and bandwidth saturation during major incidents.
Other speakers include Lee Thompson, who will discuss regional critical care, alongside specialists from EPRR and HART. Dräger supports the conference and focuses on collaboration, innovation, excellence, resilience and the communities we serve.
The closing date to register your interest is 11 October 2026.
👉 Register your interest for NEAS Specialist Capabilities Conference 2026
Date: 3 November 2026
Venue: The Glasshouse International Centre for Music, Newcastle, Gateshead

Every critically ill newborn represents one of the most demanding moments in healthcare. Within seconds of birth, teams may need to assess, communicate, prioritise, and intervene in an environment where the margin for error is extraordinarily small. Technical expertise is fundamental, but safe and effective resuscitation depends on much more than clinical knowledge alone. Communication, leadership, teamwork, situational awareness, and other human factors can profoundly influence how teams perform under the highest pressure.
My guest today is James Yates, Critical Care Paramedic, educator and instructor on the Advanced Resuscitation of the Newborn Infant (ARNI) programme from the Resuscitation Council UK. ARNI is a specialist two-day programme that combines advanced clinical skills with communication, human factors, structured simulation and debriefing for clinicians caring for critically ill and sick newborns.
James brings extensive experience in teaching clinicians how to perform effectively under pressure, not simply by developing technical competence, but by strengthening the non-technical skills that underpin high-performing teams.
In this episode, we explore what high-performing teams do differently, why communication can break down during complex emergencies, and how structured simulation and expert debriefing can transform both individual clinicians and the wider systems in which they work.
We discuss psychological safety, cognitive overload, shared mental models, leadership, communication, and the challenges of facilitating meaningful debriefs with experienced clinicians. Most importantly, we consider what neonatal resuscitation can teach us about team performance more broadly, and why these lessons extend far beyond the delivery room into pre-hospital medicine, HEMS, emergency care and critical care.
If you are interested in how teams develop, adapt, and perform under pressure, this episode offers lessons well beyond neonatal resuscitation.

NEAS Specialist Capabilities Conference 2026
The North East Ambulance Service Specialist Capabilities Conference 2026 takes place on 3 November 2026 at The Glasshouse International Centre for Music, NewcastleGateshead.
Under the theme “Collaborate, Innovate, Excel,” the conference brings together professionals working across specialist emergency care, with sessions covering Emergency Preparedness, Resilience and Response (EPRR), critical care and HART.
The keynote speaker is Adam Desmond, the 7/7 Kings Cross paramedic, who will deliver a no-holds-barred talk on human factors and bandwidth saturation during major incidents.
Other speakers include Lee Thompson, discussing regional critical care, alongside specialists from EPRR and HART. The conference is supported by Dräger and focuses on collaboration, innovation, excellence, resilience and the communities we serve.
The closing date to register your interest is 11 October 2026.
👉 Register your interest for NEAS Specialist Capabilities Conference 2026
Date: 3 November 2026
Venue: The Glasshouse International Centre for Music, Newcastle, Gateshead