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What is an Emergency Care Practitioner? What does an Emergency Practitioner do? Get answers to these questions and learn all about the role of an ECP by reading below.
Emergency Care Practitioners (or ECPs) are qualified Paramedics with additional training and skills. They work closely with primary care teams to triage and assess patients, give treatment, and prescribe medication.
Emergency Care Practitioners provide an important healthcare service to elderly, vulnerable or disabled people. They are often called out to care homes to give urgent care to patients who can’t easily access GP surgeries or ambulance services.
The day-to-day duties of an ECP include: performing health checks and medical assessments in a general practice surgery, care homes or in patients’ own homes, completing and reviewing ECGs, taking pathological specimens, undertaking minor procedures, treating minor injuries, and prescribing medications or creating home care packets for patients.
Emergency Care Practitioners are an essential part of the healthcare service system. They relieve pressure from the ambulance service who needs to focus on life-threatening emergencies. They also complete pre-hospital assessments and provide care to patients who would otherwise need to be treated in overcrowded hospital settings.
Wondering what the differences between Paramedics and ECPs are? Like qualified Paramedics, ECPs are trained to provide critical care and treat minor illnesses and injuries. However, because Emergency Care Practitioners have taken steps to further their professional development, they have more autonomy over the treatment and medication their patients receive.
The entry requirements for Emergency Care Practitioners include a degree in Paramedic Science, a completed Specialist Paramedic or Emergency Practitioner course, and a valid registration with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC).
In the UK, most training courses for becoming an ECP are at a Postgraduate or Masters's (MSc) level and are offered by many universities around the country. The courses will be based on standards set by the Royal College of Emergency Care and will include both classroom-based modules and assessed practice in the workplace.
Naturally, the role of an ECP is patient-facing and therefore demands strong customer service skills on top of the expected medical expertise. As most ECPs will treat elderly, vulnerable and disabled people, they need a calm, friendly, and patient demeanour, excellent verbal and written communication, the capacity to think and work under pressure, strong decision-making skills, and the ability to work alone or as part of the wider primary care team.
Emergency Care Practitioners are classed as NHS Band 7. A Band 7 salary ranges between £40,057 for entry-level ECPs and £45,839 for more experienced practitioners. However, locum Emergency Care Practitioner roles are paid on an hourly or daily basis and typically come with higher pay rates.
Your World Nursing has a wide range of locum Emergency Care Practitioner jobs available throughout the UK. More and more ECPs are choosing a locum career because of the flexible hours, higher rates of pay, and freedom to work in multiple locations around the country.
We care about the people we work with. Emergency Care Practitioners nationwide trust Your World because we’re open, honest, reliable and part of all major NHS frameworks (that means we can provide top-quality jobs).
Join our community of hard-working healthcare professionals today by contacting us directly or applying to one of our live vacancies.
