A WOMAN assaulted and spat at a Bury paramedic, a court heard.

The employee was left extremely distressed and suffered bruising following the incident in the Newton Heath area of Manchester.

Paula Kudray pleaded guilty to assault and was given a 12 month community order at Manchester City Magistrates Court.

The incident occurred where an ambulance crew from Bury were called to concerns for an intoxicated female in Newton Heath.

The court heard that on arrival to the scene it became clear that the patient had children who needed to be collected from school. Concerned for the children, the female paramedic, who wishes to remain anonymous, asked which school the children attended so that she could help arrange for them to be cared for.

The woman then suddenly snapped, lashing out and punching the paramedic on the arm and then kicking, spitting towards and trying to bite both paramedics.

The paramedic’s crew mate then managed to restrain the woman until the police arrived.

Speaking about the incident, the paramedic said, “This was an extremely distressing experience for me particularly as it came from nowhere.

“After dealing with some other harrowing incidents around the time, the attack triggered previous terrible memories which resulted in me needing to take time off work to recover from PTSD.

“I am pleased with the sentencing and am glad and hopeful that, for her children’s sake, she gets the help that she clearly needs.

“I was in a pretty dark place after the attack, even questioning my 19 year career in the ambulance service but thanks to ongoing counselling and support from my family and colleagues I do feel much better and feel that this can finally bring me closure.”

As part of her sentence, Kudray is also required to undertake 15 days of rehabilitation activity and a 12 months mental health treatment programme as well as pay £85 in victim surcharge.

James Birchenough, Central Manchester Operations Manager for NWAS, said: “The majority of patients treat our clinicians with the respect they deserve for their hard work and dedication to the community.

“Our clinicians are there to help people in times of need so it’s appalling that they can become victims of verbal abuse or physical assault. We are pleased that this lady has been brought to justice and take a zero tolerance approach to any form of abuse against our staff.

“We always encourage incidents such as this to be reported to the police and have a great deal of support and counselling in place for staff who may be suffering both physically and mentally.”

NWAS recorded 204 physical assaults on their staff by members of the public in 2017 in Greater Manchester alone, a number which has risen by 66 per cent since 2013.