Surprised by not being able to get ambulance

[FrenchFancie]

This is in no way to have a dig at the ambulance service or at the hospitals (but maybe slightly at the junior doctors strike) but I have been really surprised recently when, for the first time in aaages, I have had to call 999 twice, and on both occasions wasn’t able to get an ambulance.

firstly my daughter was having an asthma attack, and not responding to medication. After 10 reliever puffs we called, and were told it would be a 1-2 hour wait. So we stuffed her in the back of the car and drove like idiots to the local hospital instead, where she was seen straight away. But it was a scary midnight drive. Her asthma plan states to ring 999 after 10 puffs and the ambulance should attend within 10 minutes.

second was through work where a child was having an epileptic seizure and again, we were told it was an unknown wait time, possibly 1-2 hours.

both of these things I felt really scared about, wanting urgent professional help and support, but it wasn’t available. I know I’m not going to get an ambulance for an adult with broken ankle, but kids with quick onset, possibly life threatening conditions, I was shocked there was nothing available.

is this the same now everywhere? It’s been years since I had to call 999 (like 10 years) and got a quick response last time (daughter fell off changing table, was in London and overreacted to her banging her head but the crew were lovely).

I don’t blame the ambulance service or 999 operators - in fact on both occasions the operator sounded stressed and upset they couldn’t get me help.

what, if anything, can be done about this situation?

We need local walk in centres and minor injuries units that are easily accessible by cab or private car, a public information campaign and better 111 services. People will call ambulances and go to A& E if there is no gp availability and no other service.

Well good for you if you are in a situation where you could've done better than us.

Personally I dont think the answer is shaming people for using what should be functioning emergency services in emergency situations. Of course, you get people who misuse the service. And perhaps more education here would be useful. But majority of things mentioned (sepsis, car accidents, heart attacks) are genuine emergency situations that require an emergency response. There are a multitude of reasons why it isnt always easy or even possible to make alternative arrangements, and let's not forget the extreme stress and fear people are in at that moment, not necessarily thinking clearly.

Having worked for the NHS, it is shocking to see the absolute mismanagement of funding and resources. The majority of staff on the front line and brilliant, they arent the problem. But nor are the majority of the general public using a health system that they pay into, in a reasonable way. We deserve to request and be provided with sufficient healthcare. The current system is broken, and we are allowed to be angry!

When I called 111 for my son, they told me it would be 6 hours for an ambulance but he definitely needed to be in hospital and could I get him there myself?.

It turned out he had sepsis and cancer.

Why didn’t you just take a taxi? Or drive?

The point of an ambulance is that they can provide care en route. But if you’re waiting at home for 3 hours then you’re not getting that immediate care en route, and you’re managing it for those 3 hours so you might as well take a taxi and manage it for half an hour.

Sorry, but no one just sits there for several hours with a very very sick young child. You get your kid to hospital.

I think it is very area dependent. Where I am in London it is very easy to get an ambulance as have to do it regularly for a vulnerable neighbour who should really be in assisted living.

So much so that earlier this year I was having a particularly bad migraine, a lot worse than all previous ones and I was pretty incoherent. DH called 111 as he wasn’t sure what to do and within 15 minutes we had an ambulance with 3 paramedics in my bedroom. I was mortified as I knew I just had to wait it out and there was no way I was agreeing to go to hospital with all the bright lights.

It's terrible. My mum (86) had a fall and broke her femur. She also had a head wound and was on blood thinners. Thank God we were there (we wouldn't have been, if it had happened 3 hours earlier). Two and a half hours at the bottom of the stairs and we couldn't move her. The paramedics when they came were fabulous and there wasn't a wait at the hospital (although it was 16 hours until we got her to a ward). But this shouldn't happen in a wealthy country in 2025, and we can't go on like this.

The NHS is underfunded and understaffed. Wes Streeting has only made it worse by sacking over 10,000 NHS staff. Yes their jobs were admin/back room stuff but all that work has been pushed on front line staff who now have to do these jobs plus their own. The admin work doesn’t just disappear and keeping medical records up to date on people and sent where they need to be is a vital step. It’s why we have had a surge in deaths due to doctors missing data or never getting copies of test results from another hospital or kids in routine surgery that goes wrong being transferred to ICU and the parents waiting on the ward are never told until someone realises the kid is dying and where are the parents?

My partner was attacked by a pit bull in the summer when out walking our dog. I was away with younger DCs so he had no car and wouldn’t have been fit to drive himself if he did. No friends or family round about. He was sat on the sofa going in and out of consciousness with wounds all over him and my eldest phoned for an ambulance as he was terrified and they refused to come even when it was explained he had no transport. He ended up getting a lift from my friend who had to come from another town to get him hours later. Certainly if I was there I’d have driven him myself rather than call an ambulance but what are people actually supposed to do now if they require hospital treatment but can’t get there?

I called an ambulance for someone unconscious a couple of months ago. The ambulance arrived in around 10 minutes with four ambulance men and the patient was immediately admitted to resus.
He stayed on resus for 24 hours so was blocking a bed there. He was then moved to majors.
There were no beds on a ward, so whilst there was no wait for the ambulance or to get into A&E, the rest of the hospital was full. They wanted to send him home to die - a single person with no carer, help or facilities at home and family living 100 miles away.

Yes similarly my son was in DkA on diagnosis, and had collapsed obviously we didnt know what was wrong with him at the time but the ambulance arrived in minutes and stabilised him before blue lighting him to hospital qw are only a ten minute drive thankfully.

Very sadly not surprised. My daughter has cerebral palsy and she had a fall in our hallway, backwards onto our tiled floor. I called 999, they advised me to not move her, hold her head still, nothing to eat or drink etc. she was in agony and we waited nearly 4 hours. She was besides herself. As was I.

Not that I have to explain myself to you, but it genuinely was the only and quickest option available to us. I was also being advised on the phone to NOT drive and to wait for paramedics. It ended up being longer than anyone thought it would be but fortunately she recieved life saving treatment in the ambulance en route. Which by the way took 23 minutes to get to the hospital, as opposed to 2hr3 minute journey my Google maps was predicting. Given that it was driving on the wrong side of the road the entire time due to the horrendous rush hour traffic of where we live. And also given that we dont live in an area where we are able to get taxis without prebooking or waiting several hours. And given that I also have 2 other young children at home and dont drive myself. I feel that I did the best I could with what was available to me in a genuinely frightening situation where forgive me if I wasnt thinking straight!

We had to wait for hours for my dad who had a stroke last year and 10 mins this year for my mum with breathing difficulties. With my mum it was 111 who got the ambulance to her straight away. With my dad we rung 999. So not sure if it depends on who you ring

We called an ambulance for my mum this week. She’d had a fall and it turned out to be a broken hip. But we’d got her back in bed and she was safe and warm. It came in 20 minutes. They were fabulous. But we had to queue at the hospital for an hour, which means the ambulance can’t get to anyone else until they can hand their patient over. We had to wait for 24 hours for a bed (which is actually better than previous times I’ve been to A&E with an emergency over the past few years - sadly several occasions).

I wouldn’t worry about the doctor’s strike either - from my experience you get more senior doctors on duty those days…. My son is a newly qualified doctor and is frequently left to cope on his own with his dept in A&E. he’s given a phone to call if he feels out of his depth, but on the occasions he’s called it they e been too busy to help. He’s two.months out of med school and dealing with pregnancy issues and miscarriages. And we need better training and jobs for new doctors when they finish their two years as resident/juniors.. The problems causing the strikes need sorting. It’s part of the problem with the NHS and it’s future.

My mum needed an ambulance last week, arrived in minutes but was in that ambulance, outside the hospital for 8 hours. Then overnight in a corridor. She was in for days but it was chaos.

I watch some of the police programmes and they seem to spend an awful lot of time, especially at the weekends, dealing with drunks. Having to ferry them to A&E and then sit with them waiting for treatment, which means that officer is off the beat for as long as it takes. Im old enough to remember the days when if you drank too much and fell over, either your mates had to rescue you, or phone your parents, or else you either crawled home or slept under a bush. Nowadays they xpect to be babysat by the emergency services . Maybe if that hadn't become a thing, people might take a little more responsibility for they own stupidity

This! We have ambulances queuing outside ED to offload patients

My DH banged his head at work this week, knocked himself out and came around puking, slurred speech and talking nonsense. Rang 111 and got an immediate call back, the doc he spoke to insisted on an ambulance as he was giddy. Then I got a text saying it was going to be 2 hours so I cancelled the ambulance and took him myself. Unfortunately parking at the hospital is also a nightmare, it took almost an hour to get into the car park and he was still puking and dizzy so not safe to walk in alone. Tbf once we got into a&e he had a ct scan on his head, an ecg and bloods done, checked out and discharged within two hours, all was fine. My DM’s health is poor and I absolutely dread her becoming ill.

This has been the case every time I have called 999 in the last three years. You couldn't not get an ambulance, it was just a wait to get one.
When I broke my ankle in 2022 they told me no ambulance would be sent as it wasn't life threatening and I should make my own way to hospital. I was flabbergasted.
When a friend fell off her horse and broke her leg, she waited.3 hours.

It's prioritisation. It's shocking but theres not enough medical staff and services are chronically underfunded.

When I was in Glasgow it was 10 hours for a suicidal person

I rang 999 for my mum and didn't even get to speak to anyone - I was put on hold.

We had a teen go into anaphylactic shock recently. Told to get them in a car if possible. I don’t drive atm. Took 30 mins for a first responder to get to us, ambulance came after an hour. If I had not nagged our gp for two EpiPens (they would only prescribe one) then I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t have made it. Absolutely terrifying

Somebody mentioned about calling ambulances for injured drunks. I didn't know this myself - my son who is a final year student med student mentioned it in passing - but concussion can easily be mistaken for being drunk. My son mentioned that they were helicoptering in an injured scooter user who was reported to be intoxicated but my son said it was more likely he was actually concussed. Apparently, the symptoms can be very similar.

I thought a lot of it was ambulances not being able to unload patients because of A&E being totally overwhelmed. Ambulances parked outside for hours with patients onboard not able to attend the next emergency.

With fewer doctors in A&E the ambulances will have to queue to drop off patients and hold them in the ambulance for longer than usual. It’s all connected.