'Mum is 100 and waited four hours for an ambulance'

Denise Selfe says her mother was in pain after falling out of bed but an ambulance took four hours to reach them

Figures from the NHS have showed that a third of patients are waiting more than four hours to be treated at A&E departments.

With ambulance services also reporting long delays, what is the experience like for patients and families who need emergency care?

'Mum had started crying out in pain'

Nancy McClean waited four hours an ambulance and then was put in a side room on arrival at hospital

Last month 100-year-old Nancy McClean fell out of bed at her home in Finedon, Northamptonshire.

Her daughter, Denise Selfe, was alerted to a problem via her mother's emergency button in Burton Latimer.

She arrived at about 23:15 BST after a three-mile (4.8km) journey from her home.

Ms Selfe says: "When I got there I found mum on her bedroom floor. I assume she had been there for about half an hour."

She says she rang for an ambulance immediately.

Ms Selfe says: "I said she was a lot of pain. When I got through on the phone line, they said it was going to be a four-hour wait.

"I explained the situation; that my mum is 100, in good health, but very frail. They said, 'no, it will still be four hours'.

"I then rang back at quarter past 12 because mum had started crying out in pain."

She believed her mother might have broken her hip but was told it would be a three-hour wait as it was not life-threatening.

Ms Selfe rang again about 30 minutes later, when again she was told of a significant wait.

She says the wait was "very frustrating", but an ambulance "eventually turned up at quarter past three in the morning".

The ambulance crew apologised for running late, she says.

Ms Selfe says she and her mother arrived at Kettering General Hospital at just after 04:00 and she says it was "very busy".

"We went in, saw one nurse, but then there wasn’t any availability for anywhere so we were moved into a side room, which was more like an office, just enough room for the trolley and myself," she says.

After x-rays revealed no breaks she was told her mother could go home at around 07:00.

Ms Selfe says: "They are so busy in the hospitals and the ambulances are having to wait at the hiospital.

"At Kettering, there were four ambulances waiting to go in.

"The people themselves, the staff, they are very apologetic because they don’t want to make people wait but it’s a sad show really.

"It's a ridicolous how bad it is, everybody has just lost their morale. It's quite sad really, they are so busy, they are short-staffed, they are just run ragged." 

A spokesperson for Kettering General Hospital apologised for delays at A&E but said it "reflects the current winter pressures on NHS services".

"Kettering General Hospital, like most acute hospitals, is seeing large numbers of patients requiring emergency care - particularly older patients with long term conditions that need support," said the spokesperson.

 "This is leading to longer waiting times for assessment in our A&E department and for admission to hospital beds."

Michael Jones, from the East Midlands Ambulance Service, which serves Northamptonshire, apologised for delays getting to patients.

He said: "Unfortunately, we continue to experience a sustained level of life-threatening and serious emergency calls and we continually work to prioritise the sickest and most severely injured patients first.

"Handover delays at emergency departments continue to be the main challenge."