A man has been Tasered after two paramedics were stabbed in an incident described by an eyewitness as being “like something off the TV”.

West Midlands Police said they arrested a man after the incident on Stephens Close in Wolverhampton at around 12.15pm on Monday, with the witness saying she heard “a blood-curdling scream” after the paramedics went in.

West Midlands Ambulance Service (WMAS) said the paramedics, thought to be a man and a woman, were treated at the scene before being taken to hospital where they are “doing well”.

The ambulance service said it had also treated a man who was Tasered at the scene.

A male detained at the scene is now helping police with their inquiries and “may have been suffering a mental health crisis”, officers said.

Anita Millard, 65, who lives next door, said a man lived alone at the property, and it had been his elderly mother who had first raised concerns for his welfare after he failed to answer the door.

She described how two paramedics arrived, along with two police officers, before they managed to gain entry by removing a door panel with a screwdriver borrowed from a neighbour.

She said: “The police asked the man’s mother to step back and then the girl paramedic went in, followed by the other medic.

“Then all I heard was a blood-curdling scream.

“He had two knives – I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Mrs Millard, who has lived in the close for five years, added: “The male paramedic then came backwards out the house and he shouted into his radio ‘help, help, we’ve both been stabbed’.

“Then he pushed the female paramedic backwards towards the side gate, and away from it all.

“The guy was stood in the porch holding these knives.

“Then the police came in and shouted ‘Taser’ and then they Tasered him.

“It was like something off the TV.”

At the scene, a police cordon was in place while the centre panel of the maisonette’s front door could be seen propped against the house.

In a statement, WMAS said: “Two members of ambulance service staff have been stabbed after attending a callout to check on the welfare of a man in Wolverhampton.

“The initial call came through at around 12.15pm this lunchtime to an address in Stephens Close.

“Shortly after arrival, the crew used their emergency alert to say that they had been stabbed.

“The two members of staff, both paramedics, have been treated at the scene by doctors and paramedics and have been taken to hospital for further treatment.”

Speaking at the scene Nathan Hudson, a WMAS assistant chief ambulance officer, said his staff had been assaulted and “stabbed in the chest area”.

Thanking his staff, he added: “They did an unbelievable job in very difficult circumstances.”

He said that without the quick response of the police, he “would probably have been telling a very different story today”.

Giving an update on the injured medics’ conditions, he said: “They (the paramedics) are well, they are in the Queen Elizabeth Hospital (Birmingham), and they are doing well at this moment in time.

“They are stable, without serious life-threatening injuries.”

Also at the scene, Superintendent Simon Inglis, of West Midlands Police, said: “It is too early to say in detail, but it is believed that the gentleman may have been suffering a mental health crisis at this time.

“There was no wider motive for the attack on the paramedics and nobody else in the community should feel any fear.”