FREC 3
First Response Emergency Care - Level 3
Core Clinical Framework
The Qualsafe Level 3 Award in First Response Emergency Care (RQF) – FREC 3 is a nationally recognised pre-hospital care qualification designed to develop confident, capable responders who can assess, treat and manage patients in a wide range of emergency situations.
The course develops a structured approach to patient assessment and emergency care, covering areas including:
Primary and secondary patient assessment
Catastrophic haemorrhage and major bleeding control
Airway and breathing emergencies
Cardiac arrest and resuscitation
Trauma and medical emergencies
Head, spinal, chest and abdominal injuries
Fractures, dislocations and musculoskeletal trauma
Burns and environmental emergencies
Recognition of serious illness
Patient monitoring and observations
Effective communication and clinical handover
Casualty movement and ongoing patient management
Decision-making, situational awareness and escalation of care
At The Soteria Group, however, we believe FREC 3 should be much more than learning the minimum required to pass an assessment.
Our courses are built around real-world clinical decision-making.
Students are encouraged to understand not simply what intervention to perform, but why, when and what happens next. Practical scenarios progressively increase in complexity and challenge students to combine clinical skills, communication, leadership, equipment management and decision-making under pressure.
Training is delivered by instructors with extensive backgrounds across pre-hospital medicine, ambulance practice, rescue, HEMS, military medicine, specialist operations and multi-agency emergency response.
That operational experience allows us to place the qualification into context, bridging the gap between the classroom and the environments where emergency care actually takes place.
We place particular emphasis on developing practitioners who can think, communicate and adapt, rather than simply follow a sequence from a training manual.
FREC 3 is ideal for anyone who requires a considerably higher level of emergency care capability than traditional workplace first aid qualifications provide.
It is particularly suitable for:
Emergency and event medical responders
Rescue personnel
Fire and rescue personnel
Security and close protection professionals
Search and rescue teams
Outdoor and expedition professionals
Construction and high-risk industry teams
Remote or austere environment workers
Maritime personnel
Individuals progressing towards careers within ambulance or pre-hospital care
Organisations developing enhanced workplace emergency response capability
No two groups attending Soteria are treated identically.
Where appropriate, we contextualise scenarios and discussions around the environments our students actually work in. A rescue technician, construction responder, security practitioner and aspiring ambulance clinician may hold the same qualification, but the operational challenges they face can be very different.
Our aim is therefore not simply to produce someone who holds a FREC 3 certificate.
We want to develop a responder who is credible, confident and useful when something genuinely goes wrong.
Students train with realistic equipment, immersive scenarios and practical problems that require them to manage the whole incident rather than concentrating on an isolated clinical skill.
This approach forms part of the wider Soteria philosophy:
Train the skill. Understand the decision. Build the capability.
Who It’s For
Stronger governance and compliance
More confident incident response
Better trained, more capable teams
Reduced risk across operations
Successful candidates receive the Qualsafe Level 3 Award in First Response Emergency Care (RQF).
FREC 3 is a regulated qualification and forms part of a recognised progression pathway within pre-hospital emergency care. Assessment takes place throughout the programme and includes a combination of theoretical knowledge and practical clinical assessment.
But certification is only part of what we want students to leave with. At The Soteria Group, our objective is for every candidate to finish the programme with greater clinical confidence, stronger decision-making skills and a clearer understanding of how emergency care integrates with the wider operational environment.
Our instructors bring experience from some of the most demanding areas of emergency response, allowing students to explore lessons that cannot always be captured in a textbook. We deliberately challenge candidates with realistic scenarios, evolving problems and structured feedback so that the qualification becomes the foundation of genuine capability rather than simply another certificate in a portfolio.
For organisations, this means developing responders who are better prepared to recognise deterioration, initiate appropriate treatment, communicate effectively with emergency services and contribute meaningfully to an emergency response. For individuals, it provides a strong foundation for further development within pre-hospital care, emergency response and specialist operational medicine.
More than a course. A capability.
Recognition & Certification
Enquire about course availability
To ensure this course is appropriate, all attendees are pre-qualified before dates are confirmed. Contact our team to discuss suitability and upcoming availability.