ABSTRACT
The London Ambulance Service (LAS) was founded in 1930 to replace the Metropolitan Asylums Board, and enlarged in 1965 to incorporate parts of eight other emergency services in the London area. In 1974 it became a quasi-independent body with its own board, managed by the South Thames Regional Health Authority under the control of the National Health Service. The service covers a geographical area of 620 square miles with a resident population of 6.8 million people, boosted by commuters and visitors to as many as 10 million. This makes the LAS the largest ambulance service in the world, with an annual budget of £70 million. About two-thirds of the budget and more than half of the staff are devoted to emergency services. The demand for emergency services increases by around 15 percent per year. The service receives an average of over 2,000 calls per day and transports over 5,000 patients, about 1,400 of which are emergency cases. Some 700 vehicles based in 70 ambulance systems attend an average of 1,200 incidents a day. They are controlled from a central control room at LAS headquarters.
