Category Archives: A&E

Slow 999 response times forcing many more people to find own way to A&E

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Figures for England obtained by Lib Dems show that 500,000 people in ‘very urgent’ need travelled to hospital without ambulance in 2023

Growing numbers of seriously ill people are making their own way to A&E in what has been called an “Uber ambulance crisis”, because 999 response times are too slow.

A&E doctors said that while they understood that people are acting out of “desperation”, they are taking a serious risk with their health, especially if they are driving themselves.

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Paramedics not sent to a third of 999 ambulance calls in parts of England

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Exclusive: Concerns over patient safety after NHS figures show less-qualified staff attending urgent calls

One in three life-or-death 999 ambulance calls in some parts of England are not attended by a paramedic, NHS figures obtained by the Guardian reveal.

The disclosure has prompted fears that seriously unwell or badly injured patients may receive inadequate care from a less-qualified member of ambulance staff lacking a paramedic’s skills.

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Emergency care issues in England contributed to 200 deaths last week, says medical chief

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Head of Royal College of Emergency Medicine says lengthy waits forcing ambulances to be ‘wards on wheels’

More than 200 people who died last week in England are estimated to have been affected by problems with urgent and emergency care, according to the president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine.

Dr Adrian Boyle, who is also a consultant in emergency medicine, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that a failure to address problems discharging patients to social care was a “massive own goal”.

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Ambulance waiting times in England three times longer in some rural areas

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Disparity between rural and urban areas uncovered by Lib Dem FoI requests to 10 ambulance trusts

Patients in some rural areas wait almost three times longer for emergency ambulances than those in towns and cities, while people with potential heart attacks or strokes now face a one hour 40-minute average wait in one area, statistics have shown.

The disparities were uncovered by freedom of information requests by the Liberal Democrats to England’s 10 ambulance trusts, which in turn covered waiting times for 227 areas across the country.

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Thousands at risk as A&E queues stop NHS paramedics attending 999 calls

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Paramedics in England missing 117,000 urgent calls each month, as CQC warns of ‘worrying new status quo’

Paramedics in England cannot respond to 117,000 urgent 999 calls every month because they are stuck outside hospitals looking after patients, figures show.

The amount of time ambulance crews had to wait outside A&E units meant they were unavailable to attend almost one in six incidents.

673 patients had to wait 10 hours or more to be handed over to A&E staff – NHS guidelines say no one should wait more than 15 minutes.

45,000 patients were delayed for at least an hour and 21,000 for at least two hours – just under the highest numbers ever seen.

While crews spent 558,000 hours attending incidents, they were unable to complete another 117,000 “job cycles”, which equates to 21% of total ambulance capacity – huge rises on the 45,000 job cycles or 7% of capacity in October 2019.

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