From Extreme to Mundane? The Changing Face of Paramedicine in the UK Ambulance Service

Brewis, Joanna; Godfrey, Richard

doi:10.4324/9781315104447-11

Cited by 20 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 37 publications

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“…Henderson & Borry (2020) used the concepts of emotional labour, street-level bureaucracy and display rules to highlight the role of organisational attributes in influencing emotional labour amongst American ambulance paramedics, "who work in a high-stress job rife with opportunity for emotional work" (p.9). Similarly, Brewis & Godfrey (2019) refer to established concepts in MOS, such as workplace emotions, occupational stress and dirty work. They argue that using these concepts could address gaps in knowledge and understanding around the rapidly changing nature of paramedic work, with its increasing component of mundane activities.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploring the wellbeing of ambulance staff using the ‘public value’ perspective: opportunities and challenges for research

Heath

Wankhade

Murphy

2021

Public Money & Management

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploring the wellbeing of ambulance staff using the ‘public value’ perspective: opportunities and challenges for research

Heath

Wankhade

Murphy

2021

Public Money & Management

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“…In UK ambulance trusts, fewer than 10% of calls are for time-critical or life-threatening emergencies. 2 A huge proportion of daily blue-light work is much more mundane, such as low-acuity, unplanned primary care callouts (see Brewis and Godfrey, 2019), as well as most of the work that goes on at HQ: a white-collar world of meetings, planning, budget-setting, training days, culture change seminars, diversity management, community policing, fire safety inspections and corporate communications. As befits the deep complexity and growing hybridity of professional organizations (Noordegraaf, 2015) uniformed emergency services are increasingly confronting the degree to which their organizations require a rank structure, clear doctrine, and direct chains of command versus the need for a more open, more white-collar 'professional' or even corporate structure and culture.…”

Section: Leadership and Authority In Emergency Services Fieldsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Operational pressures clearly affect employee morale. Burnout, poor mental health, physical exhaustion and injury, and early retirement through ill-health are legendary in the paramedic world (Brewis and Godfrey, 2019;Mildenhall, 2019). Brian Maguire's research in Australia suggests that the paramedic role is the most dangerous job in the country, with risk of serious injury seven times higher than the national average working population and twice that of police officers (Maguire et al, 2014).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Beyond ‘blue-collar professionalism’: Continuity and change in the professionalization of uniformed emergency services work

McCann

Granter

2019

Journal of Professions and Organization

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The sociology of professions has so far had limited connections to emergency services occupations. Research on emergency occupations tends to focus on workplace culture and identity, often emphasizing continuity rather than change. Police officers, firefighters, and paramedics have their historical roots in manual, technical, or ‘semi-professional’ occupations and their working lives still bear many of the hallmarks of blue-collar, uniformed ‘street-level’ work. But uniformed emergency services—like many other occupations—are increasingly undergoing processes of ‘professionalization’. The organizations in which they are employed and the fields in which they work have undergone significant change and disruption, calling into question the core features, cultures, and duties of these occupations. This article argues that sociology of work on emergency services could be helpfully brought into closer contact with the sociology of professions in order to better understand these changes. It suggests four broad empirical and conceptual domains where meaningful connections can be made between these literatures, namely, leadership and authority; organizational goals and objectives; professional identities; and ‘extreme’ work. Emergency services are evolving in complex directions while retaining certain long-standing and entrenched features. Studying emergency occupations as professions also sheds new light on the changing nature of ‘professionalism’ itself.

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“…The mental and physical demands of frontline ambulance service personnel are extreme (Brewis & Godfrey, 2019). The role can be physically taxing, cognitively challenging, and staff may be regularly exposed to traumatic events (Clompus & Albarran, 2016).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

An exploration of within-dyad interpersonal emotional influence in the ambulance service.

Freemantle¹,

Stafford²,

Wagstaff³

et al. 2022

Sport, Exercise, and Performance Psychology

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Ambulance service personnel experience an array of emotions when working on shift. Nevertheless, there has been a lack of research to date regarding the interpersonal effects that frontline staff members’ emotional experiences and displays can have on their crewmates’ behavior and emotional state. This study used a critical realist research approach to explore the influential within-dyad effect of emotional exhibitions in frontline ambulance pairs. Ambulance service personnel (N = 18) were recruited to take part in individual interviews and to complete postshift voice diaries. Using abductive analysis methods, evidence for the emotions as social information (EASI) model processes, affective reactions and inferential processes, was presented through examples of self-reported interpersonal emotional transfer and emotional regulation. In addition, retroductive analysis of the interview and voice diary transcripts identified facilitative factors affecting the enaction of these social–emotional processes. The themes of understanding each other, managing emotions differently, expectations from above, and responding to different callouts were reported to contribute to the tendency for affective reactions and inferential processes to occur. These findings provide support for the impact that EASI model concepts can have in performance domains and offer evidence to suggest how these socially influential processes may be contextually facilitated. The results presented in this study can be used by ambulance service trusts to better understand and improve the emotional relationships of their frontline dyads.

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From Extreme to Mundane? The Changing Face of Paramedicine in the UK Ambulance Service

Abstract: For guidance on citations see FAQs.

Cited by 20 publications

References 37 publications

Exploring the wellbeing of ambulance staff using the ‘public value’ perspective: opportunities and challenges for research

Exploring the wellbeing of ambulance staff using the ‘public value’ perspective: opportunities and challenges for research

Beyond ‘blue-collar professionalism’: Continuity and change in the professionalization of uniformed emergency services work

An exploration of within-dyad interpersonal emotional influence in the ambulance service.

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