Urgent Emergency Care - Ambulance Handover

Background Information

We want to understand people’s experiences of being handed over from an ambulance crew to hospital staff. This is important because we are reviewing how the changes introduced through the national ‘Release to Rescue’ model, including Handover 45 has affected patients, families, and carers since implementation in August 2025.

Release to Rescue is a term used by both hospitals and ambulance services across England to support patient flow and ensure more ambulances are available to respond to emergencies.

A key element is Handover 45, the standard that ensures no ambulance handover takes longer than 45 minutes from arrival at the emergency department. When a full clinical handover cannot be completed within that time, hospital and ambulance teams work together to transfer responsibility for the patient in an agreed, risk‑assessed way. This enables ambulance crews to return more quickly to responding to other patients who need urgent care.

Why your experience matters

For patients and carers, a handover is more than a process it is part of the care journey. Good handover should include clear communication, dignity, compassion, and timely transition into hospital care.

We want to understand your experience from the moment you arrived at hospital and were transferred from the ambulance crew. What happened next? How did it feel?

What will we do with your feedback?

We will use your feedback to produce a report which will be shared with the people who are doing the review. We will share the report in the "what you told us" tab, To be kept up to date follow the project, click on the blue follow tab on the top right of this page

Your views matter to us. Tell us your views by completing the survey.

To complete the survey, please click on the blue "Take the survey" tab below.

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