My 93-year-old mother waited 10 hours on the floor for an ambulance
Graham Anthony says his mum Margaret Owen was asking for help "and sometimes screaming in pain".
Margaret Owen, a 93-year-old woman from Abercynon, Rhondda Cynon Taf, experienced a harrowing ordeal after falling in her home on October 4th. Her son, Graham Anthony, was alerted to her fall via her lifeline alarm at 6:15 AM and called for an ambulance at 7:35 AM. However, it wasn't until 3:30 PM that a St John Ambulance worker arrived at their request, and another 90 minutes passed before an ambulance ultimately arrived to take Margaret to the hospital.
The elderly woman had fractured her femur and shoulder and required surgery, but she has yet to leave Royal Glamorgan Hospital.
Graham expressed his deep disappointment with the 10-and-a-half hour wait for help, describing it as a sense of hopelessness. He called for a significant improvement in the health service's response to elderly patients in distress. The Welsh Ambulance Service acknowledged the incident, expressing regret for Margaret's experience and promising a review of the call management process.
NHS Wales has been working to categorize ambulance calls based on urgency, with categories ranging from red (cardiac or respiratory arrest) to green (less urgent). However, the median response time for red calls, which includes Margaret's situation, still exceeds the target of six to eight minutes. The health service has acknowledged the distressing situation for patients and their families, and a new emergency and acute care policy framework is set to be published in the autumn to address these concerns.
Written by urgent.news from BBC Health's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
