WAITING times for police prisoners to see medics are improving, according to South Yorkshire's top cop.
A report prepared by Chief Constable Med Hughes says changes have been made to the way healthcare is provided in custody suites following two deaths in police custody in South Yorkshire and national guidance on the best way to keep prisoners safe. Under the old system custody suite staff had to ring around to find an available doctor. Now an organisation has been contracted to provide medics - sending response times dropping from an average of two hours to just 34 minutes in December.
A review of the old system found that in some cases it was taking up to five hours for medics to respond.
Medics - or police surgeons - assess detainees, set care plans and prescribe and administer medicine. They also look at the health and behaviour of prisoners for their own safety and to protect other detainees and staff. Medacs Healthcare took responsibility for providing medics in September.
A review of the first few months of operation found that in December alone medics were required to attend custody suites on 1,068 occasions.
The Chief Constable said: "Between September 1 2009 and November 30 2009, Medacs Healthcare were contracted to attend at least 70 per cent of calls within 60 minutes and they achieved 85 per cent in September and October and 88 per cent in November.
"Under the previous system, custody staff were required to make several telephone calls - in some cases lasting up to 30 minutes - to identify a police surgeon who was available to attend at the suite.
"Medacs Healthcare has a purpose-built call centre and South Yorkshire Police has a dedicated free telephone number, which results in telephone calls lasting approximately one minute.
"It was anticipated that the new contract would result in a reduction in the amount of constant supervision undertaken within the custody suites as vulnerable detainees were medically examined more speedily."
Between September 1 and December 31 last year there was a 29 per cent reduction in the amount of constant supervision undertaken, compared with the previous four months.