>#Heart attack patients face ambulance waiting times of more than an hour
>Oliver Wright, Chris Smyth, Eleanor Hayward
>Thursday December 01 2022, 12.01am GMT, The Times
>Patients face a postcode lottery when they call 999 with a medical emergency, an analysis has shown after ambulance workers announced plans for the first national strike for 30 years.
>Some with life-threatening conditions are waiting up to three times longer than those in other towns and cities. Patients with a suspected heart attack or stroke in Bristol wait over an hour on average for an ambulance to arrive, while those in Oxford wait just 19 minutes. The longest average wait was one hour 41 minutes, in Cornwall.
>Medics should arrive within 18 minutes after “category two” calls for a serious condition, such as a stroke or chest pain, which may require urgent assessment or transport to hospital. This target was met in only two areas: Croydon in south London and Carlisle.
>The news follows the announcement that more than 10,000 ambulance workers plan to strike across nine trusts in England and Wales. The GMB and Unite unions said members working as paramedics, emergency care assistants and 999 call-handlers had voted to strike over pay and working conditions.
>Unison revealed on Tuesday that 80,000 of its members, including paramedics, cleaners and porters, had backed industrial action. With nurses already due to strike on December 15 and 20, health chiefs fear that unions will co-ordinate walkouts to take place at the same time. In total four health unions have confirmed they will go on strike, involving at least 200,000 staff in the biggest ever wave of NHS industrial action. Midwives and junior doctors are also preparing to walk out.
>Ministers believe patients will turn against unions as disruption mounts over the winter. Rishi Sunak dismissed nurses’ pay demands yesterday as “unreasonable”. The analysis of ambulance trust figures by the Liberal Democrats found that in 32 areas the average wait for a category two call had more than doubled in the past two years.
>There were also major discrepancies for “category one” calls, where patients have an immediate life-threatening condition. This covers those who are not breathing or unconscious.
>Category one calls should be answered within seven minutes. But data shows patients in Sevenoaks in Kent and Maidenhead in Berkshire waited between 12 and 13 minutes for an ambulance on average, while those in Hammersmith in west London waited only five minutes. The longest average waiting time was in West Devon: 15 minutes, more than double the national target.
>The GMB said ambulance workers and others in the health service were “on their knees”, adding: “No one in the NHS takes strike action lightly. Today shows just how desperate they are.
>“This is as much about unsafe staffing levels and patient safety as it is about pay. A third of GMB ambulance workers think delays they’ve been involved with have led to the death of a patient. Something has to change or the service as we know it will collapse.”
>Steve Barclay, the health secretary, said his “door remains open” but “our economic circumstances mean unions’ demands are not affordable”.
>•Britain is to be disrupted by strikes every day until Christmas in a new winter of discontent (Ross Kaniuk writes). Rail workers, including staff at Eurostar, nurses, teachers, security guards handling cash, driving examiners and rural payments officers are all planning industrial action.
>The union representing civil servants, including Border Force officers, Passport Office staff and National Highways employees, has backed strike action but is yet to confirm dates.’
>The Unite and GMB unions announced yesterday that ambulance workers had voted for industrial action and possible strikes before Christmas.
>It follows Unison, which represents thousands of health workers, including ambulance staff as well as porters and cleaners, announcing on Tuesday that 80,000 members had backed taking industrial action. With inflation at 11.1 per cent fuelling a cost of living crisis, unions are seeking big pay rises, but government departments have been told they are allowed to increase pay in 2022-23 by no more than 3 per cent.
>Today bus workers will walk out in London, while 115,000 Royal Mail staff are on the second day of a 48-hour strike. The Communication Workers’ Union, representing 115,000 postal workers, plans industrial action on December 9, 11, 14, 15, 23 and 24. The walkout will affect deliveries and businesses sending out orders made during Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
>Tina McKenzie, the Federation of Small Businesses chairwoman, said: “We urge both sides to do their best to find a landing zone for compromise.”
>On the railways there will be national shutdowns on December 13, 14, 16 and 17 and January 3, 4, 6 and 7. Separately RMT Eurostar will walk out for four days. Nurses are planning to strike on December 15 and 20.
Murdoch owned Times pretending its support for successive extreme right-wing anti NHS Tory governments has nothing to do with the situation?
You would have to have a heart of stone not to laugh!
I mean at that point, you may as well not bother treating them… anything shorter than 10 minutes is realistically a dead body…
Time is muscle. This will be the difference between minuscule damage resolved with coronary PCI (gold standard) and a 5 year lifespan disabled in a chair at home on heart failure meds waiting for a transplant that never comes. Fuck the Tories.
Get these absolute fucksticks out of government for the next three decades and we might have a chance as a country.
My mum had a heart attack in November 2 years ago. We live in North Wales, about 15 miles from the nearest hospital. It was about 1am when she told me she had unbearable chest pains, so I phoned 999 for an ambulance. I told them her symptoms and they said it would take 1 hour 40 minutes for an ambulance, so I said I’d take her myself. We still had to wait 7 hours in A&E before she got seen by a proper doctor.
The NHS is in really bad shape right now.
Even some local cab companies do recognise issues with ambulances waiting times and do have separate funds to cover costs for people who do not have means to pay for a taxi to hospital in emergency, so drivers and dispatchers do not refuse calls for rides from people unable to pay a(hats off to them)- but politicians?
Terrifying. Truly terrifying. The Tories and their market worshipping death cult cronies need to be consigned to the pages of history.
Meh… Just an hour? I waited 4 1/2 hours last December for an ambulance to arrive this time last year when I had a heart attack.
You are now better off driving yourself or your relative down to the ED yourself, even though that means doing so without access to any medical equipment during the journey. The risk of a long waiting time at home means that it is a worthwhile trade off though. It’s similar to people in the US getting an Uber to hospital because they cannot afford an ambulance. This is how bad the NHS has become under the Tories.
This is the “free” health care they want for the US? I really like the idea of my health care being at the whim of politicians budgets. LOL
That’s scarey. If that was 7 years ago, I’d be dead today. 100%. Ambulance came in 5 minutes, when I had cardiac arrest.
Is anyone else shocked about the state of all this at the moment?
Putting aside the simple response of what do you expect from the tories.
I mean is anyone, like myself, totally shocked about how utterly mismanaged and misgoverned the country seems to be? It’s as though the current incumbents are just not working at all for the British people and all the half decent MPs seem to be missing – how can they be so out of touch?
13 comments
>#Heart attack patients face ambulance waiting times of more than an hour
>Oliver Wright, Chris Smyth, Eleanor Hayward
>Thursday December 01 2022, 12.01am GMT, The Times
>Patients face a postcode lottery when they call 999 with a medical emergency, an analysis has shown after ambulance workers announced plans for the first national strike for 30 years.
>Some with life-threatening conditions are waiting up to three times longer than those in other towns and cities. Patients with a suspected heart attack or stroke in Bristol wait over an hour on average for an ambulance to arrive, while those in Oxford wait just 19 minutes. The longest average wait was one hour 41 minutes, in Cornwall.
>Medics should arrive within 18 minutes after “category two” calls for a serious condition, such as a stroke or chest pain, which may require urgent assessment or transport to hospital. This target was met in only two areas: Croydon in south London and Carlisle.
>The news follows the announcement that more than 10,000 ambulance workers plan to strike across nine trusts in England and Wales. The GMB and Unite unions said members working as paramedics, emergency care assistants and 999 call-handlers had voted to strike over pay and working conditions.
>Unison revealed on Tuesday that 80,000 of its members, including paramedics, cleaners and porters, had backed industrial action. With nurses already due to strike on December 15 and 20, health chiefs fear that unions will co-ordinate walkouts to take place at the same time. In total four health unions have confirmed they will go on strike, involving at least 200,000 staff in the biggest ever wave of NHS industrial action. Midwives and junior doctors are also preparing to walk out.
>Ministers believe patients will turn against unions as disruption mounts over the winter. Rishi Sunak dismissed nurses’ pay demands yesterday as “unreasonable”. The analysis of ambulance trust figures by the Liberal Democrats found that in 32 areas the average wait for a category two call had more than doubled in the past two years.
>There were also major discrepancies for “category one” calls, where patients have an immediate life-threatening condition. This covers those who are not breathing or unconscious.
>Category one calls should be answered within seven minutes. But data shows patients in Sevenoaks in Kent and Maidenhead in Berkshire waited between 12 and 13 minutes for an ambulance on average, while those in Hammersmith in west London waited only five minutes. The longest average waiting time was in West Devon: 15 minutes, more than double the national target.
>The GMB said ambulance workers and others in the health service were “on their knees”, adding: “No one in the NHS takes strike action lightly. Today shows just how desperate they are.
>“This is as much about unsafe staffing levels and patient safety as it is about pay. A third of GMB ambulance workers think delays they’ve been involved with have led to the death of a patient. Something has to change or the service as we know it will collapse.”
>Steve Barclay, the health secretary, said his “door remains open” but “our economic circumstances mean unions’ demands are not affordable”.
>•Britain is to be disrupted by strikes every day until Christmas in a new winter of discontent (Ross Kaniuk writes). Rail workers, including staff at Eurostar, nurses, teachers, security guards handling cash, driving examiners and rural payments officers are all planning industrial action.
>The union representing civil servants, including Border Force officers, Passport Office staff and National Highways employees, has backed strike action but is yet to confirm dates.’
>The Unite and GMB unions announced yesterday that ambulance workers had voted for industrial action and possible strikes before Christmas.
>It follows Unison, which represents thousands of health workers, including ambulance staff as well as porters and cleaners, announcing on Tuesday that 80,000 members had backed taking industrial action. With inflation at 11.1 per cent fuelling a cost of living crisis, unions are seeking big pay rises, but government departments have been told they are allowed to increase pay in 2022-23 by no more than 3 per cent.
>Today bus workers will walk out in London, while 115,000 Royal Mail staff are on the second day of a 48-hour strike. The Communication Workers’ Union, representing 115,000 postal workers, plans industrial action on December 9, 11, 14, 15, 23 and 24. The walkout will affect deliveries and businesses sending out orders made during Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
>Tina McKenzie, the Federation of Small Businesses chairwoman, said: “We urge both sides to do their best to find a landing zone for compromise.”
>On the railways there will be national shutdowns on December 13, 14, 16 and 17 and January 3, 4, 6 and 7. Separately RMT Eurostar will walk out for four days. Nurses are planning to strike on December 15 and 20.
Murdoch owned Times pretending its support for successive extreme right-wing anti NHS Tory governments has nothing to do with the situation?
You would have to have a heart of stone not to laugh!
I mean at that point, you may as well not bother treating them… anything shorter than 10 minutes is realistically a dead body…
Time is muscle. This will be the difference between minuscule damage resolved with coronary PCI (gold standard) and a 5 year lifespan disabled in a chair at home on heart failure meds waiting for a transplant that never comes. Fuck the Tories.
Get these absolute fucksticks out of government for the next three decades and we might have a chance as a country.
My mum had a heart attack in November 2 years ago. We live in North Wales, about 15 miles from the nearest hospital. It was about 1am when she told me she had unbearable chest pains, so I phoned 999 for an ambulance. I told them her symptoms and they said it would take 1 hour 40 minutes for an ambulance, so I said I’d take her myself. We still had to wait 7 hours in A&E before she got seen by a proper doctor.
The NHS is in really bad shape right now.
Even some local cab companies do recognise issues with ambulances waiting times and do have separate funds to cover costs for people who do not have means to pay for a taxi to hospital in emergency, so drivers and dispatchers do not refuse calls for rides from people unable to pay a(hats off to them)- but politicians?
Terrifying. Truly terrifying. The Tories and their market worshipping death cult cronies need to be consigned to the pages of history.
Meh… Just an hour? I waited 4 1/2 hours last December for an ambulance to arrive this time last year when I had a heart attack.
You are now better off driving yourself or your relative down to the ED yourself, even though that means doing so without access to any medical equipment during the journey. The risk of a long waiting time at home means that it is a worthwhile trade off though. It’s similar to people in the US getting an Uber to hospital because they cannot afford an ambulance. This is how bad the NHS has become under the Tories.
This is the “free” health care they want for the US? I really like the idea of my health care being at the whim of politicians budgets. LOL
That’s scarey. If that was 7 years ago, I’d be dead today. 100%. Ambulance came in 5 minutes, when I had cardiac arrest.
Is anyone else shocked about the state of all this at the moment?
Putting aside the simple response of what do you expect from the tories.
I mean is anyone, like myself, totally shocked about how utterly mismanaged and misgoverned the country seems to be? It’s as though the current incumbents are just not working at all for the British people and all the half decent MPs seem to be missing – how can they be so out of touch?