Woman, 93, Waits Over 10 Hours on Floor for Ambulance

A 93-year-old woman with broken bones lay on the floor of her home for 10-and-a-half hours while she waited for an ambulance. Margaret Owen, who has dementia and lives in Abercynon, Rhondda Cynon Taf, fell on 4 October.

Her son, Graham Anthony, went to her house after her lifeline alarm called him at 06:15. He says an ambulance was requested at 07:35. A St John Ambulance worker arrived only at 15:30, at the request of the Welsh Ambulance Service. An ambulance followed 90 minutes later and took her to hospital.

"Listening to her repeatedly asking for help and sometimes screaming in pain has left me with a feeling of hopelessness," Anthony said. His mother had broken her femur and shoulder, needed surgery and has not yet left Royal Glamorgan Hospital, almost three weeks after the fall. Anthony praised the ambulance crew who attended and said they treated her "really well". But the experience, he said, "knocked my confidence in our health service's ability to respond".

Service says it is sorry

Lee Brooks, the ambulance service's chief operating officer, said he was sorry to hear about Margaret's experience and grateful to have it brought to his attention. "Waiting almost eight hours for help is not the standard of service we want to provide," he said. A preliminary review found "aspects" of the way the call was managed that need further investigation, and staff are looking at whether the service could have responded differently.

Anthony has made a formal complaint to the ambulance service and the Welsh government. He posted about the delay on Facebook, and the response "has been huge", with hundreds of people describing similar waits for elderly relatives. "There are far too many examples of similar injuries, similar waits," he said.

The Welsh government said it recognised how distressing it can be to wait for care after an injury and that improving access to care is a "key priority". It added that a new emergency and acute care policy framework will be published this autumn.

The figures

The latest published figures show 10,977 patients waited 12 hours or more for an ambulance in August, 733 (6.3%) fewer than in the previous month. Over the past two months, the median response time for red calls was nine minutes and 32 seconds, missing the six to eight minute target. For orange calls, which cover serious conditions, the median rose to nearly one hour 30 minutes, up from about one hour.

Source: BBC News