BEEP Doctors, a Cumbrian-based charity, has announced that it smashed the £145,000 fundraising target it set itself in 2021.

Now, in 2022, it has taken on an even bigger challenge of raising £250,000 to buy four new emergency vehicles, which can be used in all four corners of the county.

It was the first time in their 28-year history that BEEP Doctors has taken on such a big fundraising challenge.

However, the charity has grown considerably over the past few years, and they needed to raise more money than usual for their future sustainability.

When it first began, The BEEP Fund, as it was formally known, only had three doctors working in a 15-mile radius of Penrith.

But now the charity has fourteen actively responding volunteer doctors all over Cumbria.

More doctors mean more equipment, more training, more medicines and specialist kit – helping them to save more lives across the county.

In 2021 the team of volunteer doctors who are on call 24/7 were called to 394 incidents.

Of these, 124 were in Carlisle, 84 were in Eden, 63 were in South Lakes, 61 were in Allerdale, 37 were in Copeland and four were in Barrow in Furness.

They also attended 16 call outs in the Lancaster area and two in Scotland. Three incidents were unrecorded.

The money raised last year bought vital equipment for the team, including seven Schiller Touch 7 Monitor/Defibrillators, plus seven AED Defibrillators, seven Butterfly ultrasound devices, several new PAX kit bags, new PPE Uniforms (in a brand-new design) for each Doctor as well as paying for the cost of moving to new premises in Penrith.

Funding for this equipment came from donations from the community as well as local and national funders such as the Hadfield Trust, Proven Family Trust, Sellafield Snowball Charity, Sir John Fisher Foundation, the Mark Benevolent Fund and The Saturday Hospital Fund.

The BEEP Doctors were also lucky enough to have a new Volvo XC60, fitted out with emergency lights, dash cams, and branded livery donated to them by Smarter Metering Services with contributions from BASICS National and the HELP Appeal.