Planning an event and need first aid cover?
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Providing first aid cover for your event
As an industry leader in event medical care, we provide fully trained and equipped personnel at more than 20,000 events every year. We are registered with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) who monitor, inspect and regulate our services to make sure that we meet fundamental standards of quality and safety. St John Ambulance are authorised by the CQC under the Health and Social Care Act 2008 to carry out the regulated activities including; Ambulance Services, Transport services and Treatment of diseases, disorders or injury.
Our dedicated teams in logistics, event management, and first aid work closely together to deliver first-class care. Our medical plans are industry leading and adhere to nationally agreed procedures.
We have experience in successfully delivering first aid, ambulance, and medical cover at events across the country. You can find us at major sporting fixtures, such as Wimbledon, Premier League matches, the London Marathon, and horse racing meets. You can also find us at music festivals, carnivals, exhibitions and expos, air shows, horticultural shows, and county fairs.
Whether it’s a multiple-sited large event over several days or a small local community event, we can help support your event.
What we offer with our event first aid cover
Trusted high-quality care
We are registered with and regulated by the Care Quality Commission. We are a trusted partner of the NHS and are proud of our reputation for the provision of safe, high-quality care.
Clinical governance
We operate to the highest standard of clinical governance in line with the Care Quality Commission’s regulations. We have specialist Clinical Managers and Assurance Managers who work together to ensure that these standards are maintained.
Any patient seen by us is recorded on our Patient Report Form (PRF). Samples of our PRFs are regularly audited by our clinical team to ensure that they are capturing the correct clinical and patient information.
All PRFs are recorded and stored in a safe environment and in accordance with the Data Protection Act.
Highly trained personnel
Our highly trained personnel use their expertise to manage, anticipate, and minimise first aid issues at events. All incidents are carefully recorded with the necessary paperwork.
All our first aid personnel complete a rigorous training and assessment schedule before they can practise at events. Their assessments include annual clinical competency assessments set by our qualified assessors.
In addition, all our personnel at events have a minimum of Safeguarding Level 1 training.
Additional expertise
We have the largest group of first aiders in the UK all trained to use defibrillators and some with enhanced skills to use medical gases.
Our healthcare professionals have a diverse range of skills and experience. This includes pre-hospital advance life support provided by doctors, paramedics, and nurses.
We also have the largest fleet of Cycle Responders in Europe, who often arrive first on the scene in a crowded situation.
Event management and logistics
All our staff in operational roles complete additional role-specific training, alongside their clinical training. For example, our Event Managers are trained in the JESIP Principals. Our larger events will be over seen by a Customer Relationship Manager and an Event Planner who will take care of the operational event delivery, providing our event customers with a specific point of contact.
St John Ambulance First Aiders will arrive to events with a first aid kit and a defibrillator.
Event Logistics
Our event logistics teams provide the latest equipment resources, including:
- oxygen therapy (for us by Advanced First Aiders, Ambulance Crews and HCPs)
- carry chairs and stretchers
- professionally equipped ambulances and treatment centres
- large medical treatment centres for our bigger events.
Our equipment undergoes annual servicing to ensure it is always fit for purpose.
Radio communications
We can also provide resilient radio communications and mobile command centres.
At larger events, we provide a Controller to manage the communications and deployment of our staff. The Controller can make dynamic decisions based on the circumstance of each incident. This ensures appropriate resources are dispatched in line with established clinical protocols.
First aider
Our first aiders are trained and assessed in the following clinical competencies:
- Basic life support and defibrillation
- Consent, capacity, and mental health
- Data protection and information governance, including patient record keeping
- Incident management
- Infection prevention and control
- Management of bone, muscle, and joint injuries including sprains, strains, and fractures, as well as, splinting and immobilisation
- Management of emergency child birth
- Management of hot and cold injuries including burns and scalds, heat-induced illnesses, and hypothermia
- Management of medical conditions including diabetic emergencies, seizures, chest pain, stroke, and allergic reactions
- Management of special types of wounds and foreign bodies including bites, stings, and objects embedded in eyes and ears
- Management of unconscious and unresponsive patients
- Management of wounds and bleeding
- Management of airway and breathing difficulties, including choking
- Patient observation and assessment skills
- Radio communications
- Wound care, dressing, and bandaging
Advances first aider
Our advanced first aiders are required to meet the clinical competencies of a first aider as well as the following:
- Additional fracture splinting and immobilisation techniques
- Administration of medical gases (oxygen therapy and pain-relieving gas)
- Airway management with airway adjuncts, suction, and resuscitation devices
- Helmet removal
- Patient evacuation and movement techniques and equipment, including carry chair, carry sheets, and stretchers
- Spinal injury immobilisation
Ambulance crew
Our Emergency Ambulance Crew (EACs) are trained and equipped to modern pre-hospital standards. They support our First Aid volunteers on events, work on specialist NHS contracts, and provide additional capacity to NHS 999 services. Competencies include:
- Comprehensive patient assessment skills including obtaining 12 lead ECG and recognition of gross abnormalities.
- Intermediate life support including airway management with i-gels and capnography.
- Administration of analgesic and lifesaving medications such as adrenaline, Penthrox, salbutamol, glucagon and more.
- Assessment and management of obstetric, medical, surgical and trauma patients including management of catastrophic haemorrhage.
- Assisting Healthcare Professionals to provide advanced life support and enhanced patient care.
- Selecting appropriate treatment pathways for patients in their care, discharging or referring to a variety of NHS care providers and specialist centres, including providing blue light emergency transport when required.
Our Emergency Ambulances are:
- Fitted with advanced cardiac monitoring and essential life-saving equipment ensuring the highest standard of pre-hospital care.
- Kitted with Ten-Second Triage kits and have bolstered capability in providing life-saving interventions, reducing the care gap prior to NHS arrival during major incidents.
Healthcare professionals
We also have a range of healthcare professionals, including doctors, nurses, paramedics, and physiotherapists, who can provide care and treatment at your event.
Our healthcare professionals can provide:
- advanced life support and airway management
- extended patient monitoring and assessment
- treatment and prescribing for specific injuries and illnesses
Getting the right level of first aid cover for your event
There are many factors that affect the level of cover you will need at your event. These are some of the things we consider when looking at a quote for your event:
- Previous event data. For example, whether you've run the event before, and the previous casualty rates
- The type of event. For example, whether it’s a classical music concert or a rugby match
- Whether it is indoors or outdoors, and the type of venue
- Seated or standing audience
- Audience profile. For example, where it's families, predominantly young people, or rival factions
- Size of audience (a rough estimation of what you would need might be 2 first aiders per 1000 people)
- The kind of activity being carried out and whether it is high risk
- Time of year (this is particularly relevant to outdoor events)
You will also need to provide us with a risk assessment of your event. You can find out more on how to create a risk assessment on the Health and Safety Executive's website.
Event guidelines
When considering what medical cover is right for your event, there are many guidelines out there to follow which might appear confusing. This is why we’ve put together a comprehensive list of event guidelines. As experts in the field with decades of experience, you can trust us to adhere to all the relevant industry guidelines in planning safe cover for your event.
The main ones we use are the Purple Guide for event cover, and the Green Guide, which covers safety at sports grounds.
About our pricing
Once we have received all the information we need about your event, we will be able to assess what level of cover you need, and whether your event meets our threshold for a charitable discount. Some events, such as community and charity events, would qualify for review against our community pricing tariff.
We have a minimum four-hour charge, and we do not send lone workers. Our minimum level of cover would be 2 First Aiders.
Supporting our charitable work
Charging for our event first aid cover allows us to:
- input the revenue back into our charitable work
- provide free or discounted first aid cover to communities and charities in need of our support
- invest back into equipment and training for our personnel
Contact us
If you're not sure what type of event first aid cover you need, our regional events teams would be happy to discuss your options.
North
Counties: Northumbria, Durham, North Yorkshire and Teesside, South and West Yorkshire, Humberside, Cumbria, Lancashire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside, Cheshire
Email: north-events@sja.org.uk
London and South
Counties: London, Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Berkshire, Hampshire, Surrey, Kent, Sussex, Isle of Wight
Email: south-events@sja.org.uk
East
Counties: Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire and Rutland, Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire, Norfolk, Cambridgeshire, Suffolk, Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire, Essex
Email: east-events@sja.org.uk
West
Counties: Cornwall, Devon, Somerset, Avon, Dorset, Wiltshire, Gloucestershire, Shropshire, West Midlands, Staffordshire, Warwickshire, Worcestershire, Herefordshire
Email: west-events@sja.org.uk
Events outside of England
Please contact one of our sister charities for event cover outside of England:
- St John Cymru (Wales)
- St Andrews First Aid (Scotland)
- St John Scotland
- St John Ambulance in Jersey
- St John Ambulance in the Isle of Man - please email info@sja.org.im
- St John Ambulance in Guernsey
- St John Ambulance in the Republic of Ireland
