An NHS ambulance service says Microsoft Copilot helped it send a smaller share of patients to A&E. Rotherham's is now 56%.
Microsoft posted a film on 21 October about Yorkshire Ambulance Service, an NHS trust that took about 1.25 million 999 calls in 2025-26. Staff use Copilot to pull data from several systems into reports they check themselves.
In Rotherham, the share of ambulance journeys that end at an emergency department fell from "the mid-60% range" to 56%, Microsoft says. The trust's own target is 50%. Microsoft's article says Copilot helped collate the data and identify opportunities, which "supported an improvement".
NHS England says Copilot is for admin work only. It makes no clinical decisions. A new hub that arranges home care and referrals for non-urgent patients is part of the same change.
Neither the film nor the article gives a cost or a licence price. Neither cites an independent check of the figure, and the article puts the starting point at 60%. NHS England plans to offer Copilot to as many as 505,000 staff after a trial with 30,000.
A lower A&E share does not prove better care or lower cost. Did those patients stay out of hospital, or did the cost move to community care?
🎥 Video: Microsoft, official YouTube channel, 21 Oct 2026 · narration: AI voice
What the captions say
- Yorkshire's ambulance service took about 1.25 million 999 calls last year.
- Its staff use Microsoft Copilot to pull data together.
- Copilot does admin only, never clinical work.
- In Rotherham, fewer ambulance trips now end at A&E.
- The share fell from the mid-60s to 56%.
- The service's own target is 50%.
- Microsoft's account: no outside audit, no cost published.
