What's the longest you have had to wait for an ambulance?7

Ambulance services (locally anyway) will pay for a taxi to the hospital if it’s safe to do so
usually after a phone assessment if the patient has no other way of getting there, needs to be seen but doesn’t require an ambulance

Obviously, a proportion of elderly people who are unwell enough to need to call an ambulance will be likely to die soon whatever happens.

But it is also true that spending a prolonged period lying on the floor after a fall (known as a 'long lie') greatly increases the risks of complications and poor outcomes. I don't think we should be accepting that someone who spends six, 12 or 24 hours on the floor waiting for an ambulance would just have died anyway.

This is harsh but a reality - those posting about elderly relatives dying shortly after a wait need to honestly question whether it was just as simple as that persons’ time was up.
Pulling an elderly frail person back from the brink rarely ends well for the patient.

My brother is currently complaining that our elderly mum, who suffers from dementia, had to wait nearly 24 hours for an ambulance after a fall. He says that as the risk of her physical condition worsening she was not able to properly eat or sleep whilst she was waiting which made her more confused and distressed. He believes and official complaint should be made, and a letter written to our MP as this clearly shows a broken system (but has made it clear he thinks I should be the one to do this).

This is, technically, true and I don't doubt that the ambulance service is over stretched and some people are suffering serious consequences. However, she fell at home and had no physical injuries but a nurse who came out to visit her recommended going to A&E for some tests as mum thought she might have passed out but couldn't be sure and didn't know how long she may have been unconscious for. This was approx 12 hours after the fall and in the meantime mum had been able to move around, eat etc. My brother decided (despite the nurse advising that this would take longer) that mum should go by ambulance. I am not sure why as she was mobile and he had his car at her house and planned to go with her anyway. He claims he was not sure how she'd manage getting in and out of the car. So she would clearly have been at the bottom of the priority list for an ambulance. He decided she should not go to bed or try to make a proper meal just in case the ambulance arrived. The ambulance actually arrived within 12 hours of being called.

I'm not surprised people can't afford taxis. Last time I got a taxi to the nearest A&E, it was a tad under £40. That was 5 years ago, I suspect it would be a fair bit more now.

And the taxis are metered, so it costs more if it takes longer because of heavy traffic or similar, so you have no way of knowing how much it will cost.

2.5 hours. Not for me but for a stranger I was with who had been critically injured in an accident (about as bad as it can get without being actually dead).

About 15 mins. Hit and run. A kid had been knocked off his bicycle.

I've never called one personally but work in medical complaints - sadly waits of well over 12hrs are not uncommon. What lots of people don't know is that even if someone gets an ambulance they could then be waiting for up to another 12hrs in it, outside the hospital, before being admitted, which obviously stops that ambulance going to help anyone else in the meantime.

Can't believe that someone has asked why people don't get alternative transport! Don't you think if they could, they would! Not everybody drives or is capable of bodily lifting another adult, not to mention people who have injuries that can't be moved. Do you think a taxi driver is going to help lift someone who has broken their leg? A friend's father was having a stroke late at night and was told an ambulance would be up to 8 hours - their mother had to run around knocking on the neighbours doors to wake them up to help her pick him up and get him into a car.

I think people call ambulances thinking they will skip the waiting room. Someone in this thread said their relative wouldn’t have coped with waiting room. You still go in the waiting room at A&E unless your condition requires you to go straight through. Same as when you turn up. I turned up to A&E on my own steam for heart attack 2 and 3 and was taken straight through. On the other hand I’ve been with dc in an ambulance and sat in waiting room.

Some of things in this thread I would have always made my own way to A&E. Obviously not if someone is immobile.

My late DGmother, ~ 9 hours at the age of 94. She was ?#NOF so couldn't be moved. Luckily it was in the nursing home where she lived and a member of staff sat on the floor with her.

No family could go to her as it was during first lockdown.

At the time I was so angry. But in hindsight, she was safe where she was and as the falls team came and assessed her with the paramedics it saved her having to go to into a&e for assessment around all the drunks and germs.

For myself under 5 mins even though I was inside the GPs on nebs, as I was mid asthma attack.

An hour and 10 minutes with an elderly man who had slipped in the street and severed an artery (as it turned out he'd also cracked 3 ribs and damaged his spleen).

A friend and I were giving first aid whilst kneeling in a huge puddle of blood.

How we managed to keep such hard pressure on his wound for all that time is still beyond me.

Over an hour for DH who'd had a stroke, impossible to move him so couldn't drive him myself nor get him into a taxi even if I'd been able to get one (lived rurally, not all areas have good taxi coverage). There were no available ambulances locally so one came from the next county. There was also a 10 minute wait just to speak to a call handler.

About 3 hours for a newborn (just over a week old) with laboured breathing. Every half hour the ambulance service sent me the following text:

"We apologise for the delay, our service is currently under a high demand. If your condition worsens or changes, please call back on 999. Alternatively reply CANCEL to stand down the ambulance response."

Edit: so sorry to those who lost loved ones/they suffered following a delay.

I have only experienced it twice, 1st was someone who had a funny turn and started slurring their words - took around 15 minutes I think. 2nd was full term bleeding at home - must have been less than 2 minutes.

First one didn’t end up needing transferring to hospital, second did.

7 hours. My FIL died after 6 hours and 45 minutes.

If I couldn’t do anything else then yes.

And I say that as someone who held a blue floppy 2 week old who wasn’t breathing and sped through our town holding him in passenger seat on way to our adult minor injuries whilst he slowly turned from blue to grey. They weren’t peads but they saved his life. They told me if I had called for an ambulance he would be dead.

If we don’t have services here and that’s the most sensible option then no I will not feel bad for lying to try to get any help I can.

In a super emergency where I cant get to a hospital and it’s urgent I am being completely honest I would call the fire brigade.

How would this work? You dial 999 and when asked 'what service please' you say your house is on fire??

We live in Rugby, town of over 100,000. They cut our ambulance stations a number of years ago. Now they come from over half an hour away in dead of night blue lights.

Sadly people have died. We now have defibs on every street corner thanks to one family who sadly lost their son at 18.

So never waited. Never called. I know they aren’t coming.

In a super emergency where I cant get to a hospital and it’s urgent I am being completely honest I would call the fire brigade.

Elderly parent with advanced dementia, waited 10.5 hours after they fell and broke their hip. Because of the dementia it was impossible to explain to them what was happening and why we were leaving them in agony. Unfortunately the paramedic bore the brunt of parent’s frustration once they did arrive and tried to transfer to the ambulance, and then the A&E staff had the same treatment. Never underestimate the strength and anger of a dementia patient even if they’re elderly and in severe pain!
On the positive side at least they were indoors and not lying on a icy street.

Where we live there are volunteer responders who will use their own vehicle to take people to A&E, unfortunately our only experience of this service was negative and left the patient with lifelong issues as a result.

Immobile 94 year old in respiratory distress. GP rang 999 and was told minimum of 12 hours.

December 2024.

DD is also a paramedic. During Covid, was queuing outside waiting for A&E to admit, was relieved at the end of her 12 hour shift, and then returned to the same patient, still queuing, 12 hours later at the start of her next shift, a 27 hour wait in total. Much better now apparently, and
would be better still without their ‘frequent flyers’ (time wasters)

The out of hours GP service did this for my grandparents each time.

Utterly surreal interactions in the middle of the night

Just yesterday someone I know saw a very (90ish) elderly man fall in the shopping centre precinct. Very obviously broke his hip, was screaming in pain and laying on the cold pavement. Ambulance service apparently said it would be 3 hours or more. No idea of the outcome but I think that it is utterly unacceptable for someone of that age and vulnerability to not get help when they need it.

A friend's dad died after waiting 6 hours on the floor at home. He hit his head and bled into his brain. He was in too much pain from maybe rib fractures to move. He was a completely well man in his 70s. While they were waiting he became cold, confused and then unconscious. The ambulance service rang back periodically and were updated but didn't arrive until he'd gone past the point of being helped. His family had to support him through that with no support themselves.

We needed an ambulance for a family member with severe breathing difficulties when the ambulance service was on strike (winter 2022). They had low oxygen and the GP was v worried. We had to sort it all out ourselves and it was terrifying. It ended up with a prolonged hospital stay for double pneumonia.

I have actually been changed by these experiences and I no longer have any faith that help is available for those who need it when they need it.

I find it hard to take training at work seriously for example when you know the infrastructure won't support you in a timely manner.

It should not be a completely lottery in the UK in 2025. Some people will get gold standard responses and life saving treatment, and others will be left to deteriorate and possibly die in the cold and in pain. And that's not to do with triage or priority but availability of resource.

It's a strategic funding choice.

About 10 mins.

Over nine hours, but the circumstances were unusual. A relative had died at their home and we needed an ambulance crew to confirm the death before they could be released to the care of the funeral director. It wasn't great for us, but it was the right call by the ambulance service. Prority was rightly given to the living.