Forty minute ambulance wait (From Warrington Guardian)

Forty minute ambulance wait

AN ELDERLY woman who suffered a bad fall in Nantwich town centre was left lying in agony for almost 40 minutes before paramedics came to her aid.

The woman, who has not been named, endured a 39-minute wait for an ambulance after falling in Market Street, near St Mary's Church, at around 2.10pm on Friday, August 5

Kind-hearted passers-by, one a physiotherapist, rushed to her aid and immediately dialled 999, believing she had suffered a broken hip.

But more than half an hour later, she was still lying on the pavement.

Despite the wait, Mersey Regional Ambulance Service (MRAS) say paramedics arrived on scene 21 minutes INSIDE their one-hour target time.

Jill Bagshaw, who was walking her dog at the time, said: "There was an elderly lady lying on the pavement with two people helping her.

"They thought she had broken her hip so they comforted her, covered her to keep her warm and made a pillow for her head.

"I came back about 25 minutes later and she was still lying there on the cold pavement, clearly very distressed.

"I'm absolutely disgusted by what happened. If she had suffered a heart attack, she would be dead."

MRAS has confirmed it received a call to a woman who had fallen.

But based on the information they received, the call was classified as 'not serious'.

In such circumstances, paramedics are given an hour to reach the scene, a target they comfortably achieved.

In emergency situations such as heart attacks, the ambulance service has an eight-minute target time.

A MRAS spokesman said: "Based on the information received by our emergency control room the call was classified as not serious and not life threatening.

"The trust has a locally agreed target, which requires us to respond to calls of this nature within an hour in 98 per cent of cases.

"In this instance, the Trust responded within 39 minutes of the call to our emergency control room."

Nantwich councillor Arthur Moran has now called for the ambulance service to review its response times.

He said: "It is certainly too long to wait. When an elderly person falls you have to get there as soon as you can.

"Getting there in 39 minutes isn't good enough, and I think they should have a look at it.

"A fall for an elderly person can have serious repercussions, and in cases such as this, they need to be getting there quicker."