Georgette Eaton

Georgette Eaton

NIHR Doctoral Research Fellow and Clinical Practice Development Manager for Advanced Paramedic Practitioners in Urgent Care

Georgette Eaton is a NIHR Doctoral Research Fellow and the Clinical Practice Development Manager for Advanced Paramedic Practitioners in Urgent Care within the London Ambulance Service NHS Trust. Prior to this appointment, she split her employment between clinical practice and education, balancing work as a specialist paramedic in urgent care across a range of settings with being Senior Lecturer in Paramedic Science at Oxford Brookes University. Alongside this, she has been the regional South Central Trustee for the College of Paramedics (2017–19) and continues to be a member of the Education Advisory Group and the Primary and Urgent Care Special Interest Group within the professional body. She was a graduate paramedic from Coventry University in 2011 and after ‘topping up’ to BSc (Hons) began practising as a specialist paramedic (then an emergency care practitioner). She completed her first MSc in Critical Care at Cardiff University in 2017 and her second in Education Research Design and Methodology at the University of Oxford in 2018. She is currently reading for a DPhil in Evidence-Based Healthcare at the Nuffield Department of Primary Care, University of Oxford. She is also the author of Law & Ethics for Paramedics and forthcoming publication, Primary Care for Paramedics.

When not working or studying, she can be found running or cycling in the Cotswold Hills neighbouring her home.

We spoke to Georgette about the production of her book, Law and Ethics for Paramedics:

C. Why have you written the book?

G. For as long as I can remember, I have always been fascinated about how people think and what guides them. As an undergraduate paramedic, I was also completely thrown by elements of the legal system, and how certain legislation applied to paramedics, and the multiple complexity law in the UK seemed to operate in. Whilst I was studying for my paramedic degree and my first Master's degree, I kept returning to ethics and really struggled to find published material that applied to specifically to paramedics. I guess I wanted to provide something to future students, and the profession as a whole, that wasn't available when I was studying. It was really important to me to be able to bring as many paramedics who had specialised some way in law and ethics together, so that the book would be a collection of their expertise but also written by paramedics, for paramedics. I also wanted to make sure it included the whole of the UK - during my previous reading, I realised that a lot of books or articles focus on the English legal system. Whilst much of English law is adopted across the whole of the UK in some form, there are certain differences in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales that are really important for Paramedics to know about - and I wanted to capture that difference too.

C. What drives you as a person?

G. Lord Baden Powell (the founder of the Scout Association and Girlguiding UK) said "Try to leave the world a little better than you found it". I guess that's always stuck with me since I was a Brownie!

C. What was your experience like working with Class to produce the book?

G. Class were absolutely fantastic and Dee and Lianne both deserve medals! They were always on hand if I had any questions, put up with my constant re-ordering of chapters and finding new chapters to be included. The support throughout the project was fantastic, right from sending Dee my project proposal to getting the project off the ground and throughout the writing process. The proof-reading, reviewing and copy-editing components were smoothly handled by Class and I am really pleased to have published through them.