“Significant challenges across the whole health and social care system” impacting on local response times and health service

Health officials have said ambulance delays and long waits at emergency departments falling “well below the level of service we strive to provide.”

The comments come after two major incidents in Wrexham in the last week which have drawn heavy criticism from the public and raised concern over the current response times.

On February 28 a woman was taken to hospital following an incident on Grosvenor Road. It was later reported that it took almost 90 minutes for an ambulance to attend the scene.

A petition has also been launched following the death of a man who had been struck by a car in Johnstown last week.

Family member Ellie Williams, who started the petition on Thursday, wrote that her grandad was left on the “cold, wet road for over four and a half hours” waiting for an ambulance to arrive.

She went onto say: “We fear that he may have had an internal bleed, which left for over four and a half hours has proved critical and ended with my Grandad passing away.

“The wait on ambulances is becoming a matter of life or death and something drastically needs to change, it’s happening all too often in the North Wales area.

“Paramedics go to work to help the people most in need and they are being prevented from doing this as there are no ambulances available & even when getting patients to the hospitals they are queued up waiting outside as there is no beds for patients.

“We are in 2022, there are people dying due to the waiting times of ambulances & the lack of beds. We need to do something about this together. Please sign this petition and help no other family have to loose a loved one from having to wait for help.”

The Welsh Ambulance Service has since confirmed that it is working “as quickly as possible to establish the full sequence of events and will be contacting the patient’s family as part of this process.

Handover delays between the ambulance service and the health board were cited as one potential reason why it took so long for an ambulance to attend the scene.

Amid growing concern over the current state of the health service last week we contacted local representatives and the Welsh Government detailing a range of issues highlighted to Wrexham.com recently around treatment times and other issues in the local hospital as well as ambulance response times.

We asked each fairly basic questions;

• Were they aware of the issues, and did they reflect a specific problem or is this now commonplace?
• What was their understanding as to why the issues were happening?
• What they were doing to ensure the circumstances do not occur in future?

Wrexham’s Member of the Senedd Lesley Griffiths said there is “no quick fix” and that the effects of the coronavirus pandemic will be “felt for a number of years.”

The last two years have seen routine appointments cancelled, NHS staff seconded to the covid-19 vaccine rollout and increased pressures on the health service caused by the virus.

Issues with accessing GP appointments and a fear of contracting the virus has meant that some health conditions have been missed and have worsened for people over the last two years.

Ms Griffiths said “rebuilding and recovering post pandemic is a priority for the Welsh Government.”

She continued: “Constituents contact me on a wide range of health issues and I regularly correspond on their behalf with the relevant bodies, whether that’s Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board, the Welsh Government Minister for Health and Social Services or the Welsh Ambulance Services Trust.

“Ensuring my constituents’ voices are heard is vital. I hold regular meetings with the Chair of the local Health Board which allows me to highlight the key concerns and issues facing people in Wrexham.

“It helps the authorities and management recognise what is happening on the ground and understand the day-to-day experiences of patients.

“After two years of a global pandemic where NHS staff have worked incredibly hard providing emergency care, maternity care, cancer services on top of the rollout of three Covid vaccine programmes, some services are very stretched. There is no quick fix and the effects of the pandemic will, unfortunately, be felt for a number of years.

“Rebuilding and recovering post pandemic is a priority for the Welsh Government. Over the next three years, an additional £1.3bn will be invested in the Welsh NHS to provide high quality and sustainable healthcare. To help address the waiting times backlog that has increased due to the pandemic, the Welsh Government has invested an additional £250m this financial year and has allocated an extra £170m recurrently from April specifically for planned care.

“Our NHS has faced considerable pressure this past two years and it will take time to recover. My focus, as always, will be to ensure Wrexham receives equal and fair funding, recognition and investment.”

Wrexham’s MP Sarah Atherton said there has been “far too many harrowing stories about the service provided by our local health and Ambulance services.”

She said: “Since the end of last year, I have been raising my dissatisfaction with the Welsh Labour Government that is responsible for the health services we receive.

“I have listened to the experiences of residents and some concerning personal experiences have emerged, from individuals waiting 36 hours in A&E, people considering moving out of Wales, to residents taking out large loans to pay for surgery privately.

“As a result, I have been standing up for residents by calling on the Welsh Government to launch an inquiry into local healthcare services – a request that was rejected by the Welsh Minister for Health and Social Care, Eluned Morgan MS. Given the ongoing health crisis, I would urge the Minister to review her decision.

“With my Conservative colleagues from North Wales, I have also met with the North Wales Community Health Council to discuss their concerns and we plan to meet with various regulatory and inspection bodies over the next few weeks to highlight our concern about the poor service being provided to North Wales residents.

“Added to this, the UK Government has repeatedly aided the Welsh Ambulance Service by allowing military personnel to support operations and last October the Chancellor, Rishi Sunak, gave the Welsh Government an additional £2.5 billion per year in funding – the most generous funding settlement since devolution in 1998.

“With healthcare devolved to the Welsh Government, it is now time that Ministers in Cardiff look seriously at the issues residents are facing and act now.”

In a joint statement between the Welsh Ambulance Service and Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board (BCUHB), Jason Killens, Chief Executive of the Welsh Ambulance Service and Jo Whitehead, Chief Executive of BCHUB, admitted that that delayed ambulance responses and waits outside emergency departments “falls well below the level of service we strive to provide.”

They said: “In common with NHS providers across the UK, we are facing significant challenges across the whole health and social care system.

“We are acutely aware of the impact that these challenges have on patients, particularly when we are unable to transfer them from ambulances in to our Emergency Departments, and release ambulance crews as swiftly as we would like.

“We understand people’s concern and frustration about delayed ambulance responses and long waits outside Emergency Departments, and we are deeply sorry for the added distress these cause our patients and their families.

“It falls well below the level of service we strive to provide.”

One approach being implemented to help tackle the growing problem health board-funded Patient Flow Coordinators “are in the process of being placed inside every Emergency Department across Wales to assist in communications with the ambulance service and ensure a smoother process for our patients.”

Patient Flow Coordinators link all the admission/discharge/transfer services of a hospital together to “help ensure the flow of patients is as seamless as possible” with the aim of reducing the risk of delayed transfers of care from one part of the healthcare system to another.

We are told they “work very closely with hospital site managers and can guide people who self-present for admission into one of the many specialities provided within the acute care setting”.

We asked for more detail on this apparent possible part of a solution, if they had been rolled out in North Wales and specifically Wrexham, and if not, when that would take place.

The answer indicated that it had not happened, and we were told they could not ‘commit to a firm date at the moment’ as to when the plan would be in place.

Ms Whitehead and Mr Killens continued onto say: “The Health Board are improving staffing numbers in Minor Injury Units and increasing the availability of community care for our frail and elderly patients, as well as continuing to work with our local authority partners to reduce delayed transfers of care to create flow through the hospitals.

“We are, as ever, grateful to our hard working staff who are doing the very best they can to assess, reach and treat patients in the timeliest manner.

“We do ask the public to continue to help us; if it is not a serious or life threatening emergency then the first port of call should be the NHS 111 Wales website, a Minor Injury Unit, a pharmacist or your GP.”

A Welsh Government spokesperson answering our question set said. “Our expectations are clear, that health boards and the Welsh ambulance service must work collaboratively, and with partners, to deliver safe and timely access to urgent and emergency care services.

“Health and care services in Wales, like all NHS services across the UK, are working incredibly hard to respond to the ongoing and significant challenges of the pandemic, compounded by a complex range of national and local challenges, which are impacting patient flow and leading to delays in access to assessment and treatment in hospitals and in the community.”

“The Welsh ambulance service, as well as urgent and emergency care, have worked tirelessly throughout the pandemic and should be commended for their efforts to continue delivering high quality levels of care in such circumstances.”

“We are providing significant funding to help the NHS recover from the pandemic, including £240m as part of our Covid recovery plan.”

“Over the last year we have invested significant sums of money in urgent and emergency care, including recruitment of additional frontline staff and introducing new ways of working, in an effort to improve the timeliness and quality of care for patients and provide support during times of unprecedented levels of demand.”

“There is an active delivery plan in place to help manage 999 demand in the community, increase ambulance capacity, and improve response times and ambulance patient handover.
“It’s important that people use the right service at the right time. Our Help Us, Help you campaign is encouraging people to access the right support.”