Young Minds Save Lives - Lifesaving starts here: empowering young minds

What is Young Minds Save Lives?

Young Minds Save Lives (YMSL) is a Scottish Ambulance Service programme that empowers young people with lifesaving skills, preventative healthcare knowledge and confidence to respond in emergencies, build personal resilience and support healthier communities.

Delivered primarily in secondary schools, YMSL is designed to create a generation of informed, confident young people who are prepared to act, look after their own health and wellbeing.

Alongside this, the programme gives young people early exposure to healthcare careers and working in the NHS. Through contact with frontline Scottish Ambulance Service staff, pupils gain insight into healthcare roles, career pathways and the skills needed across health and emergency services.

Young Minds Save Lives also aligns with employability activity, including partnership working withDeveloping the Young Workforce and The King’s Trust, helping create clearer routes into learning, volunteering, training and future healthcare careers - particularly for young people facing barriers.

What makes Young Minds Save Lives different?

A key strength of Young Minds Save Lives is that it is co‑designed with young people.

Young people, schools and communities are actively involved in shaping:

This co‑design approach ensures learning is relevant, meaningful and engaging, and allows the programme to adapt to local health needs and emerging issues. It also gives young people a genuine voice in how healthcare education is delivered by the Scottish Ambulance Service.

Why Young Minds Save Lives matters

Where a young person lives, grows up and goes to school has a significant impact on their health, wellbeing and life expectancy.

Communities experiencing higher levels of deprivation also face:

These inequalities often begin early in life and widen over time, contributing to long‑term pressure on health services and poorer outcomes for individuals, families and communities.

A population health approach recognises that improving outcomes cannot rely on emergency response alone. It requires early intervention, prevention and empowerment, particularly for young people growing up in areas most affected by inequality.

Young Minds Save Lives responds directly to this challenge by:

By focusing on secondary school pupils and prioritising schools in areas of greatest need, Young Minds Save Lives helps to break cycles of inequality, strengthen community resilience and contribute to improved population health outcomes over the long term.

“the workshop that they did at the beginning, where they asked us how we wanted to learn, because, like, I was part of that, and then, like, they actually listened to what we said, those things, which is quite rare. So that was, like, really useful.” - Student

How the programme works

Young Minds Save Lives is delivered by Scottish Ambulance Service staff, including paramedics and ambulance technicians, through a seven‑lesson programme delivered in schools.

The first six lessons build knowledge and skills across emergency response, street first aid, drug and alcohol harm, strokes and heart attacks, anxiety, stress and prevention. The sixth and final lesson brings this learning together through educational escape room challenges. 

Learning through experience: escape rooms and interactive delivery

The escape room is a defining feature of Young Minds Save Lives.

Working in teams, young people apply what they have learned to solve emergency and healthcare scenarios, reinforcing knowledge through critical thinking, problem‑solving, communication and teamwork.

Alongside hands‑on practical skills, the programme uses: