What We Do ...

Northumbria Blood Bikes delivers essential blood and other urgent medical supplies, out of hours, between hospitals and other healthcare sites in North East England.  We cover Darlington, Durham, Gateshead, Newcastle Upon Tyne City, North Tyneside, Northumberland, South Tyneside and Sunderland, though we regularly work with other blood bike groups to make relay deliveries right across the UK. 

We are a registered charity established and run entirely by local volunteers.

Saving NHS Money ...

Outside normal office hours, hospitals rely on taxis or commercial couriers to transfer urgent medical supplies or test samples between hospitals and other sites. Northumbria Blood Bikes, (like other Blood Bike groups across the country) carry out these deliveries free of charge, ensuring the limited resources of the NHS can be used where it makes a difference.

Northumbria Blood Bikes' funding comes entirely from charitable donations, we get no government or NHS contributions.  The service is provided solely by volunteers, who give up their free time to help others.  The Greek philosopher Aristotle suggested that "True generosity is to perform an act of kindness for someone that you'll never meet".  Our volunteers do this every day.  #itswhatwedo 

Improving Healthcare, Saving Lives ...

In critical situations, blood or other medical items need to be delivered urgently in order to save a patient's life. In other situations, samples may need to be sent to a laboratory for urgent testing to provide a quick diagnosis before a patient's condition deteriorates.  Blood bikes, with their distinctive livery and narrow profile, can quickly get through busy traffic to reach their destination. For bulky items, or in extreme weather conditions, we use cars too, to ensure our service is available every day of the year.

The Tip of the Iceberg ...

For every delivery that we make, for every rider and driver we have on the road, there is an army of support workers behind the scenes. 

  • We do all of our own Publicity, Marketing and Fundraising, it costs over £10,000 per month to run our service. 
  • We recruit and continually train all of our 300 volunteers - including our call handlers and despatchers
  • We work with our friends at the IAM and ROSPA for the initial training of our advanced riders and drivers. 
  • We run a fleet of around 20 vehicles using commercial workshops for most servicing and repairs. 
  • We keep copious records -  we must be able to assure the work we've done, so we keep records of our work and report back regularly to the Trusts. 

A Brief History

Work to establish our group started in September 2012, with support from the Nationwide Association of Blood Bikes and other Blood Bike groups, our team of dedicated volunteers, began our live operations just eighteen months later in February 2014.  By the end of that year we were supporting hospitals across the whole of our region and since 2015 we have also supported the Great North Air Ambulance Service with daily deliveries of blood and plasma to its two aircraft bases.  

We now perform around 15,000 deliveries per year.  On average that's around 40 patients per day whose healthcare is improved.  Demand for our service is growing all the time. 

In June 2017 Northumbria Blood Bikes was the proud recipient of The Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service - the MBE for voluntary groups - which we think recognises the value of the work we do and the professionalism and dedication of our volunteers.