University student is face of local air ambulance Christmas campaign

A Leicestershire university student is the face of this year’s Christmas fundraising campaign for the local air ambulance charity.

The story of how Katie Pease (27), from Woodhouse Eaves, was flown by Derbyshire, Leicestershire & Rutland (DLRAA) after she sustained multiple injuries in a road traffic collision is being used by The Air Ambulance Service – based in Rugby – for the annual mailing.

“Every mission flown by the air ambulance costs £1,700. The charity receives no government funding and relies totally on donations to keep flying. As it is the season of goodwill to all, I am hoping my story will encourage people to support this lifesaving cause. I am living proof of the amazing work they do every day of the year – including Christmas Day,” she says.

Katie was involved in a head-on collision with a truck on an icy road in November 2016. The sheer impact pushed the engine of her car back into her legs, leaving Katie with multiple serious injuries – including two broken femurs, a smashed left knee and foot, a collapsed lung, and a broken collar bone.

Within six minutes of a 999 call being made, the local air ambulance took off from its base at East Midlands Airport and 14 minutes later arrived at the scene of the accident.

Katie was given a cocktail of pain relief drugs and sedated to make her more comfortable, she was also given antibiotics to prevent infection of the open wound on her left knee – interventions that paramedics on a land ambulance are unable to do.

The air ambulance doctor and critical care paramedics also applied splints to her legs which would have helped curb the amount of blood she was losing.

Getting Katie to the nearest major trauma hospital as quickly as possible was crucial and it took the helicopter just 10 minutes to fly her to Nottingham for a quick transfer by land ambulance to the Queen’s Medical Centre. The same journey by road – without any hold-ups – would take half an hour.

“If I hadn’t been flown in the air ambulance it maybe that I wouldn’t have made it. I could have lost my leg or my life,” she says.

Your local air ambulance has continued to provide leading pre-hospital emergency care during these difficult times. The Christmas campaign will land with supporters on 18 November, to show your support, please click here.