Sitting in the back of an ambulance is not how I imagined it; it's a lot quieter for a start.

In fact if it wasn't for the reflection of the flashing blue light against the tarmac and the cars in front which kept veering to let us pass I would have forgotten where I was.

All that changed, however, when we arrived at the scene, of our first casualty of the night.

I was spending an evening with the ambulance staff from Larbert Fire Station. Since June last year, 11 paramedics and ambulance technicians have been based 24 hours a day at the station, with at least two on call at any given time.

The base has one ambulance, which the staff use during their 12 hour shifts, and is assisted by a rapid response vehicle.

Forth Valley team leader Ian Fyfe has 34 years' experience under his belt and helped show me the ropes on the night.

There's not much which Ian, who joined the service at 19, hasn't seen in his years on the job.

He said: "I joined because I thought it would be an interesting and varied job and it's not let me down. We provide a vital service and aim to deliver excellent patient care."

The team usually attends between eight and 10 calls a night. The incidents are extremely varied and, while overdosing on alcohol and chest pains are the most common, they deal with everything from women in labour to pensioners who get stuck in the bath tub.

Ian said: "No shift is ever the same, but, in every case, you have to have respect for the patient and their family."

I turned up for my stint with the team at 7 p.m. and it was not long before the aptly nicknamed 'bat phone' began to ring.

Calls which come through from the main switchboard are colour coded, with red being emergencies, amber being urgent cases and green being minor incidents. Ambulance staff have only eight minutes to get to the scene of a code red call. As soon as they answer the phone the clock starts ticking.

Government targets require that 60 per cent of all ambulances have at least one paramedic on board. In Forth Valley the service aims to put one on every single vehicle.

Scrupulous checks also have to be made at the beginning of each shift and before leaving for a job the team has to make sure it has a response bag jammed full of necessary drugs and equipment, a defibrillator and an oxygen cylinder.

When the phone rings for the first time on my shift I instantly feel the adrenaline kick in. It's a red call so myself and paramedics Colin Kemp and Jim Henderson are in the ambulance in seconds.

With a navigation system which would put KITT in Knight Rider to shame, we hurtle along the road heading to Denny for our first pick-up.

Colin has been a paramedic for five years, having switched from a career in the prison service.

He said: "It's a very challenging job and covers all emotions. It's also extremely rewarding."

Colin and Jim agree that dealing with the death of children is by far the hardest part of the job.

Colin said: "I'd only been in job a few weeks when I had to tend to a child fatality.

"We all have our own way of dealing with what we see and we all have our own way of working through it. You have to remain somewhat removed."

Jim, who has also been in the job five years, having previously worked as a nurse, had a similar experience. He said: "I was only two days into the job when I got my first fatality, which was a child. It brought me down to earth with a bang. I just had to get my head down and deal with it, but it is never easy."

Thankfully tonight the call-outs are not of a traumatic nature.
When we get to the scene Colin and Jim rush to speak to fellow paramedic Graeme Sneddon who arrived first in the rapid response car.

A woman has fainted and needs assistance before going to hospital.
I'm amazed at how much Colin and Jim do in the back of the vehicle before leaving for Stirling Royal. Gone are the days when paramedics would simply wheel the injured party into the back of the ambulance and head off.

They give this patient morphine to ease the pain caused by a suspected broken ankle and monitor her heart on a 12-lead ECG. This gives them a three dimensional view of the vital organ.

The ECG picks up an abnormality in her heart, so Colin and Jim give her aspirin.

Her low blood pressure and heart rate are also monitored and she is given oxygen to help alleviate this.

As they tend to her, the pair constantly make notes in a computer which is hooked up to the defibrillator. This records every stage of the medical process and a printout of the treatment the patient has received will be handed into the hospital.

Colin said: "We don't just act on what we see, we also look out for other problems which the patient may have that are not so obvious.

''I often tell patients that they get a full MOT when they get in the back of the ambulance."

By the time we leave our patient at the hospital she is feeling a lot better, but still requires further medical attention.

As soon as she is checked in safely we head back to the base so the team can prepare for another call-out.

The ambulance must be checked over again and restocked ready for the next emergency.

I'm exhausted from just watching them deal with one patient yet, over the course of the night, they end up having three more emergencies and two urgent cases.

"I wouldn't give up my job for the world," says Colin and that's the thing with paramedics and ambulance technicians; not only do they need to be highly skilled and quick to respond to situations, but every time the 'bat phone' rings they need to have the passion and enthusiasm to get back in the ambulance and deal with what ever is coming their way.

s.hart@falkirkherald.co.uk