Last year ambulances spent more than 6,000 hours waiting outside Watford General Hospital, according to BBC figures. 

Sally Tucker, the chief operating officer at West Herts NHS Trust, which runs the hospital, said last year there was a 10% increase in the number of ambulances coming to the hospital.

She said it is "responding" to the situation by making sure it treats the "sickest patients first".

Image source, West Hertfordshire Hospitals NHS Trust

Ms Tucker said the "challenge" was to make sure more patients are treated outside of A&E. She said one way is to expand its "frailty service, external" that helps treat geriatric patients that don't always need emergency care. 

Moving patients to the right area of the hospital is key, she said. 

As the pressure continues on ambulance staff in the Three Counties, Simon King, the sector head for Bedfordshire and Luton at the East Of England Ambulance Service, says it is finding ways of prioritising the people who need emergency care the most. 

He said: "More resources are kept back, so we can always respond to somebody who's acutely unwell."

This works by taking 999 ambulance callers through a "triage process" and working out if they need an ambulance or not, working out how quickly they might need one and if needs be re-direct them to another service like their GP. 

Image source, East of England Ambulance Service

Nikki Fox
BBC Look East

Up until 10:00 today, the East of England Ambulance Service received 771 emergency calls. Of those, 24 were R1 calls and 289 were R2s. 

An R1 or red 1 is a very serious call where a patient has suffered a cardiac arrest or stopped breathing. Two resources should be dispatched to these incidents where possible.

R2 is all other life-threatening emergencies and requires a response in eight minutes. 

Here's how they break down by county:

Seventy-six for Bedfordshire, 118 for Cambridgeshire, 219 in Essex, 139 in Hertfordshire, 113 in Norfolk and 106 in Suffolk.

Busy morning!

Martin Barber
BBC News

As our day with the East of England Ambulance Service crew continues, we're with Larry, who had a fall at his home in Watton.

As you can see he's doing fine now. He slipped off his push-along walker and banged his head on a radiator.

He was about to be picked up to go shopping when a taxi driver found him and called the ambulance service.

Larry says he was a rear gunner in a Lancaster and ran 42 missions in his plane, called Olivia.

He's really apologetic for having "bothered" the ambulance crew⁠⁠⁠.

"I feel a bloody nuisance at the moment," he said. "You've got people who are seriously ill."

A dementia patient with chest pain, a man with prostate cancer who feels faint, a feverish baby and an alcoholic who has hit his head... all patients attended to by one specialist paramedic in one day in North Oxfordshire and North Buckinghamshire.

The BBC spent the day with Georgette, who has to be prepared to attend anybody, anywhere, in any given day.

Alex Pope
BBC Local Live

The life of a photographer can be very varied. 

You're always on the lookout for that great shot, and it seems like John O'Reilly from the South Beds News Agency has hit the jackpot. 

He was driving in Hertfordshire this morning and happened to spot two horses in a frosty field in Hemel Hempstead Old Town. 

He said "how lucky can I be" after he saw them taking part in a bit of "horseplay" and caught them on camera at just the right moment. 

Image source, South Beds News Agency

Image source, South Beds News Agency

Watford captain Troy Deeney - whose career was disrupted when he was convicted for affray in 2012 - discusses his life in and out of football with former athlete and BBC presenter Darren Campbell.

Hear the full interview in 'Get Inspired with Darren Campbell' on Radio 5 live on Thursday, 1 December at 19:30 GMT.

Non-league Sutton knock out Cheltenham of League Two - relive Saturday's FA Cup second-round action as it happened.

The East of England Ambulance Service is hoping its taking part in a trial to improve response times will also lead to the target system being reviewed.

Kevin Brown, director of service delivery, said: "With the eight minute target, if we see someone within seven minutes and 59 seconds, it's seen as a success and if we get there at eight minutes and one second, then it's a failure, regardless of the outcome for the patient.

"What we would like to see as a measure is the outcome for the patient." 

Andrew Woodger
BBC News

As part of a trial, the East of England Ambulance Service (EEAS) control room operators are to get an extra 240 seconds to assess 999 calls.

It's an attempt to reach the eight minute response time target.

Kevin Brown, EEAS director of service delivery, said: "It's allowing us to target the right resource to the right patient. We have an extra 240 seconds to respond to that from the time of the call."

Martin Barber
BBC News

John has been telling me that only about 8-10% of the workload with the East of England Ambulance Service crew is dealing with traumas. The rest is acute medical emergencies and care of the elderly, as we're an ageing population.

We're just approaching the hospital - it's taken about 25 minutes.

We're in no hurry as our patient is stable and comfortable. Upon arrival at the N&N the patient will be given an X-ray and ECG. 

It's not yet possible to take an X-ray on the ambulances, but some of the vehicles do have ultrasound facilities.

Nikki Fox
BBC Look East

Sharon is 40 years old. She's a student paramedic and a qualified emergency medical technician. Before that she worked for a pub management company.  

Being a paramedic is her dream job. She likes the variety of the job and meeting new people. The East of England Ambulance Service really needs people like her, as it has a real shortage of paramedics.

John says his age is "just a number". He's been working as a paramedic for 24 years and did 13 years with the East Anglian Air Ambulance. He now works part-time and says "it's all about the patients". 

"It's about making a difference, not just about the worse case scenarios but those social care cases, the care of the elderly and helping to create care pathways'," he said.

Robby West
BBC Look East

The reason our reporters are out on an ambulance today is because the BBC is looking at the current state of the services around the country.

New figures collected by the BBC show the percentage of calls to the East of England Ambulance Service (EEAS) that took more than 12 minutes to respond to has risen from 14% to 22% since 2013 - the second highest in the country. 

Emergency calls to the ambulance service are broken down into red 1 calls, covering patients who are not breathing and don't have a pulse, and red 2 calls for patients in a serious condition but who are less immediately time critical, such as those who have had a stroke or fit.

Since 2013, EEAS has responded to 208,136 red 1 and red 2 calls that took over 12 minutes to respond to.

In our region, average response times for red 1 calls have increased from six minutes 39 seconds to seven minutes 30 seconds.

Average response times for red 2 calls have increased from seven minutes 12 seconds to nine minutes 17 seconds.

What's the latest at Hearts? 

Head coach Robbie Neilson spoke to MK Dons on Tuesday about their managerial vacancy.

Neilson, 36, took the Tynecastle squad through training yesterday before later meeting officials from the English League One club.

He is still expected to take Hearts for tonight's league visit of Rangers.

The Edinburgh club are currently fourth in the Premiership - two points off Rangers - while MK Dons are 19th in League One.

Read full story 

Image source, PA

Martin Barber
BBC News

These units are integral in helping the ambulance teams with diagnosis. They can also send data directly to the hospital, so by the time the patient arrives the hospital already has a full set of observations.

The units cost about £17,000, and the East of England Ambulance Service has about 400 of them.

They are based in ambulances and rapid response vehicles. 

Image source, Avon and Somerset Police

The body of a man found in the River Avon in Bath has been formally identified as 19-year-old Henry Burke.

Henry, from Ripon in North Yorkshire but who grew up in Buckinghamshire, was found in the stretch of the river off Old Orchard on Saturday.

Avon and Somerset Police said a post-mortem examination has confirmed the cause of death as drowning.

Officers say they're are treating the death as unexplained but they do not believe there are any suspicious circumstances. 

Watford captain Troy Deeney discusses his journey in football for Darren Campbell's Get Inspired show on Radio 5 live.

Martin Barber
BBC News

We're now en route to the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital, external with our first patient of the day.

Our patient has had some pain relief and bloods taken, so they can be sent for analysis on arrival at the hospital to speed up her care.

She's also getting some fluids to make sure she's hydrated.

The ambulance is equipped with a new "multi-monitor". It's a defibrillator which also measures blood pressure and oxygen saturation in the blood, among other things.

Nikki Fox
BBC Look East

I'm out with the East of England Ambulance Service this morning as the BBC spends a day looking at the pressures faced by the ambulance services.

The number of calls received by the service has risen by 30% since 2013.

We're out with the crew Sharon and John. Sharon is a first-year student paramedic who is off to university next year.   

We had an amusing start as we got in the back of the wrong ambulance! 

First call to a 93-year-old lady who has had a fall at a care home in Norwich. She is being taken to the Norfolk and Norwich Hospital. 

The East of England Ambulance service, external covers 7,500 square miles and 17 hospitals. 

The crew we're with are doing a 12-hour shift. It took them just six minutes to get from Longwater to Thorpe Hamlet, in Norwich.

Kate Kinsella
BBC Look East weather

It'll be a similar day to yesterday - dry, bright and sunny with temperatures struggling to reach 2C to 5C (36F to 41F).

Tonight won't be as cold as the past couple of nights, with many places staying above freezing, although there may be one or two spots where the temperature is lower, leading to a little patchy frost.

Watch my full forecast here: