Ambulance: What the Must Watch reviewers think
Must Watch reviewers Scott Bryan and Hayley Campbell share their thoughts on Ambulance (series five) on BBC One.
What do you think? Leave your comments below...
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(Photo credit: BBC/Dragonfly/Ryan McNamara)
Hayley says: "It shows us something that we don’t even think about"
“You’re in the ambulance with the paramedics and you’re in the phone office with the operators. It’s very stressful and an amazing piece of work.
“It’s basically an ad for the brilliance of the NHS, apart from the fact it’s clearly understaffed.
“At one time a paramedic says for every 16,500 people, there is only one ambulance in the Greater Manchester area.
“The phone operators especially are the first point of contact, so it’s terrifyingly high stakes. Every day you’re dealing with someone else’s worst moment.
“Sometimes they have to give lifesaving instructions over the phone and then the paramedics arrive. So they don’t hear what happens next.
“I feel as if this show shows us something that we don’t even think about. You don’t really think about the people that are manning the ambulance phones.
“It’s stressful but life affirming because these people care and are amazing, despite everything they’re having to deal with.”
(Photo credit: BBC/Dragonfly/Ryan McNamara)
Scott says: "Remarkable... uplifting"
“You see a remarkable sense of strength from everybody, not necessarily knowing what is going to happen next.
“There are so many moments in that opening episode where I know if I was in the same position I wouldn’t know what to do.
“It’s uplifting in the sense that you don’t really feel that there’s been storylines that have been weaved into it.
“It literally feels fly-on-the-wall, to the extent where it would be amazing to see how it was put together because it could not have been planned at all.”
The new series of Ambulance starts on Thursday 30 May on BBC One at 21:00 BST.
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