Volunteers are being sou-ght to help save lives in a community initiative to provide backup for the ambulance service.

People in Burley-in-Wharfe-dale are being urged to come forward for training to enable them to give on the spot treatment in medical emergencies.

Under the proposed community responder scheme volunteers will be taught to use a defibrillator which will be kept within the village.

And they would be prepared to save lives in the vital minutes it could take an ambulance to reach a patient.

Plans to set up the project have been launched after talks between the community council and the St John Ambulance service, and now local helpers are being sought.

Community council member John Sparshatt said under the terms of the responder scheme volunteers would take it in turns to take charge of the emergency mobile and the defibrillator.

He said all helpers would receive training from the St John Ambulance to enable them to deal with very specific medical emergencies.

He said: " It is run in other parts of the country, and it is an absolutely brilliant scheme.

"We have an ambulance station which is not that far away but you never know when an ambulance might be ferrying another patient.

"The response time could be quite a lot less for someone who is already in the village."

He added: "Training would be for a very small and defined area of medical emergencies."

He said volunteers would not attend road accidents and in some cases might simply provide calming support until the ambulance service arrived.

If enough volunteers come forward to make the scheme viable the community council will try to get around £1600 funding to buy a defibrillator.

St John Ambulance Deputy Commander for South and West Yorkshire Gordon Tollef-son, who also works for the ambulance service, said volunteers would be called out when ambulances were on other calls or too far away to respond quickly.

He stressed that the community responders would probably be called out very infrequently - but when they were they could literally save lives.

Mr Tollefson said a scheme set up at South Milford had only received about eight calls in the first year - but he stressed that when responders were called upon to help they could make the vital difference between life and death.

He said in a recent case a man had collapsed of a heart attack and died near Wakefield ambulance station while both ambulance were out dealing with other emergencies. In this sort of case community responders could be called upon, he said.

He added: "I think the other thing is that in their own personal lives if they were at a relatives house for instance and something happened they would have the knowledge and the confidence that St John would give them to be able to deal with it."

Volunteers will be given initial training of around ten hours to enable them to handle basic medical emergencies such as chest pains, heart attack, or choking. They will be given refresher training every six months.

Anyone interested in taking part should contact John

Sparshatt on 864613.