Ambulance worker: ‘It has never been this bad’
PATIENTS requiring ambulances are being warned they will be routinely waiting more than six hours – and sometimes overnight – for paramedics to get to them, as managers battle to protect the most critically ill.
Ambulances are still speeding to the highest category calls – those assessed as life threatening, with a risk of death without urgent intervention – within minutes.
But the West Midlands Ambulance Service control room is now at ‘Surge Level 4’ – meaning any patients deemed to need an ambulance but who are classed as ‘urgent but not critical’ are facing horrendous delays.
Some are being left hours at a time – including elderly patients unable to get back up or be moved after a fall and women in late stage labour.
It is a desperate situation, with lengthy delays outside hospitals partly to blame.
Ambulances are routinely stuck in queues outside A&Es with poorly patients on board because of overwhelming pressure.
“I have never, ever, known demand this high,” said Sajaid Hussain, a 999 calls assessor with the service for ten years.
His comments were echoed by everyone the Birmingham Post spoke to in a visit to the ambulance control HQ in Brierley Hill.
Richard Smith, a calls assessor now leading a team set up to boost the numbers of 999 callers diverted to alternative care, said: “It has never, in my experience, been this bad. I was recruited into this team in August, because of the surge in demand. We thought it would be a temporary surge but it has never gone away.”
Service bosses have repeatedly warned that rising demand, hospital handover delays and extra 999 calls due to overwhelming pressures on GP and community services were combining to put patients at harm, with some patients already dying while waiting for ambulances to get to them.
Paramedic Adam Aston posted a video on Twitter showing the pressure on him and colleagues as he pulled up at Sandwell Hospital to offload a patient – only to find 17 ambulances in front of him.
Urgent efforts to improve vaccination and booster rates and reduce other GP services in the face of the threat from the Omicron variant of Covid-19 are also likely to trigger more calls to 999, health leaders fear.
A recruitment drive for more call assessors and clinicians is still under way to try to bolster numbers taking and providing support to 999 and 111 callers; and hospitals are devising plans to ensure ambulance patients can be offloaded more quickly.
But right now the problems are intense, and the impact of delay on patients is causing huge worry.