Local company donate much needed storage to SARS

When Sarah Manning, MD of Secure Stores Nationwide, met Gina Saunders from the Suffolk Accident Rescue Service (SARS) at a networking meeting she was hugely impressed to learn about the life-saving work of their volunteer paramedics and doctors.

SARS provide specialist volunteer responders to assist the East of England Ambulance Service at the scenes of serious medical emergencies or trauma. Their volunteers include anesthetists, critical care paramedics and other clinicians with enhanced prehospital skills.

These clinicians are authorized to carry specialist drugs and additional life-saving equipment not found on frontline ambulances. This means they can deliver an additional and advanced level of patient care, not normally available outside the hospital environment.

SARS receives no central government funding and relies on voluntary donations to fund equipment and training for their clinical volunteers. As Sarah explained, ‘I wasn’t really aware of SARS or their life-saving work – but when I heard Gina’s presentation I was keen to help them in any way I could.’

Sarah’s business supplies shipping containers for a wide variety of different uses, from offices and workshops to simple (or even customized) storage. Gina immediately saw how that could be useful to SARS.

‘The problem is that our clinicians require a huge amount of medical equipment, and we need even more kit every time we recruit a new responder. A lot of it is bulky – things like monitors, or manikins for CPR training sessions – so there’s always a need for additional space.’

Sarah was quick to suggest that one of her containers could solve their problem. ‘It was such an obvious way to meet their needs – and SARS has a generous landlord at Woolpit Business Park, Bob Baker, who was happy to let SARS have some unused space on the site.’

Gina was delighted. ‘It’s so important and valuable when a business gives us an asset as useful as this one. We’re already making very good use of Sarah’s container, and she’s also doing a sponsored walk to raise funds for us in September!’

If you’d like to donate to SARS yourself their website is at www.sars999.org.uk.

For further information, please contact Sarah Manning on 0208 125 7015, email sarah@securestores.co.uk or log onto https://securestores.co.uk.