Watchdog Calls For Your Story On Ambulance Wait Times
The North Wales Community Health Council is calling for patients who have suffered long ambulance waits at Wrexham Maelor Hospital to get in touch.
The North Wales Community Health Council (NWCHC) is a public body with responsibility to act as the local NHS Watchdog. It is an independent organisation which represents the interests of patients and the public in the National Health Service in North Wales.
Following our story yesterday about the queue of twelve ambulances outside the hospital over sixty comments have been left on our Facebook page, with more emails, tweets and forum posts on the topic with a range of views.
Generally the comments were supportive of the staff while documenting personal accounts of their experience with the health system recently, with a small selection below:
Julia said: “I was in A&E for 8 hours on Thursday and it was clear that people sadly misuse the service.”
Holly said: “I was there on Thursday with a suspected blood clot on my lung. There was 6 ambulance waiting and another one while I was waiting. People had been there 7 hours and weren’t getting seen.”
Katie documented: “My Nana was very seriously ill on Friday and the GP tried everything from 10.00am to get her a direct bed admission to respite or a ward but there were none, none anywhere. In the end ambulance had to take her to a&e as they had no other option. She waited outside a&e for 6 hours. It then took another 5 hours to get a bed free, that after the gp struggling for 9 hours to try and find her a bed previously.”
One person emailed to say they rang for ambulance at 1pm yesterday and had ‘first class’ treatment, however ended up sitting outside A&E in an ambulance until 4.30pm then after being admitted ‘he lay on a trolly till 8.30pm’.
Fallon mentioned: “Staff in that department work their arses off sometimes going a whole shift without a proper break.”
Lisa said: “The staff were fantastic polite and very helpful. Under these circumstances that must be very hard for them. Understaffed over worked. These people have my respect 100%.”
Following the story yesterday we have been tweeted some accounts as well:
@wrexham waited 2hrs for an ambulance lastnight whilst my dads condition was almost fatal, no ambulances were available for a critical call!
— Carley Edwards (@CarleyEdwardsx) December 2, 2014
@CarleyEdwardsx @wrexham Waited 2 hours for an ambulance for my 79 y/o mum last week who'd had a fall, one came from Flintshire in the end!
— Nicky Smith (@NickyS74) December 2, 2014
@CarleyEdwardsx @wrexham My dad, 91, spent 3 hrs outside Maelor last Wed in ambulanance & rest of night in A&E before a bed was found.
— Jennyta (@JennyAspin) December 2, 2014
@dedwards098 @wrexham better off in an ambulance with trained staff than sat in a waiting room tho!
— Jemma Williams (@JemmaWilliams) December 1, 2014
Unfortunately there was no one able to take our call this afternoon at the NWCHC, and the link to their website via their twitter profile is invalid.
We want to hear from patients who have suffered long ambulance waits at Wrexham Maelor
— North Wales CHC (@NWCHC) December 2, 2014
After a small bit of googling we would suggest looking at website on http://www.wales.nhs.uk/sitesplus/900/home , or tweet them @NWCHC.
There is also an online survey asking “please tell us your views about NHS services in North Wales”, you can find that via this link.
Pic tweeted to us by @jace3312 of the Maelor yesterday afternoon.
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