Thursday 18 August 2022 01:34 AM Elderly woman, 90, was left waiting for FORTY hours for an ambulance with a ... trends now

A 90-year-old woman was left waiting 40 hours for an ambulance and then kept in the van overnight — while parked outside A&E.

Daphne Syms fell at her home in Saint Austell, Cornwall on Sunday evening but was not helped by paramedics until the Tuesday afternoon.

The pensioner had a suspected fractured hip and after the 17-mile journey to Royal Cornwall Hospital, was left waiting outside overnight, due to a queue in the Accident and Emergency department.

Her son, Steven Syms, said that the NHS system is 'totally broken' and his mother would have 'died' if she'd had a more serious accident at home.

She is now due to have an operation on her hip.

'We're literally heartbroken to see a 90-year-old woman in such distress, just sat there waiting,' Mr Syms told BBC Radio Cornwall.

'It’s the not-knowing how ill she was or whether she had broken anything. The system is totally broken.'

He said that it took nine minutes of ringing before his 999 call was answered. 

'If that was a cardiac arrest, nine minutes is much too long – it’s the end of somebody’s life,' her son added.

Mr Syms said that paramedics are 'being abused and used as part of the nursing section at Royal Cornwall Hospital', instead of focusing on emergency call-outs.

'Paramedics are absolutely incredible people,' he added. 'They need and want to carry on and do the job they’re trained for.

'The system is not deteriorating, it’s totally broken and needs to be urgently reviewed.

In a Care Quality Comission report from June, it warned that 'significant work' is required to solve problems with emergency care in Cornwall. 

Debbie Richards, chief executive of the Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation Trust said the average wait for Category 2 calls in the region was 'hovering around the 200-minute mark'.

'I am not proud to report this,' she told the Health Service Journal.

In some cases, the delayed response from paramedics meant that GPs were providing urgent treatment to patients.  

A spokesman for the South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust told the Telegraph: 'We are sorry and upset that we were unable to provide Mr Syms’s mother with the timely response and care that she needed.

'We are working with our partners in the NHS and social care in Cornwall, to do all we can to improve the service that patients receive.'

A spokesman for the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly’s integrated care system said that teams 'work together' to support those in need of care.     

NHS data for last month showed the average ambulance wait for Category 2 calls — which include heart attack and stroke victims — surpassed 59 minutes in England for only the second time ever.

This is more than three times the maximum wait-time of 18 minutes. 

Ambulance waits for the most serious 999 calls last month hit a record high of nine-and-a-half minutes. The target is seven minutes. 

Family are forced to build makeshift shelter out of a GOAL, bin bags and umbrellas for elderly father, 87, who broke his pelvis and ribs as he waited 15 HOURS for an ambulance 

A family was forced to build a makeshift shelter for their 87-year-old father who broke his pelvis and ribs after he waited 15 hours for an ambulance.

Pictures taken by Cornwall resident Karen, who did not give her surname, show a football goal covered with three umbrellas and two sheets of tarpaulin, in an effort to shield him from the elements while he waited for emergency services to arrive.

She claimed that her elderly father was forced to wait more than half a day on Monday after falling, suffering two fractures to his pelvis, seven broken ribs and an arm wound.

The photos were posted to social media and

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