why didnt they just drive her?

[NormaSmuff]

www.shorehamherald.co.uk/news/health/gran-waits-an-hour-for-ambulance-with-broken-wrist-1-7987356

I cant believe this story. Unless they are missing the part where her relatives have perhaps been drinking. Otherwise the scandal is absolutely on them.
Do you really need an ambulance for a broken wrist?

I know people on mumsnet are very good at diagnosing over the Internet, but that ladies face is very bruised, her wrist was broken and her hip is described as severely bruised. How would a person know it wasn't broken. I have called an ambulance for a 90 year old after a fall and they were very clear on the phone not to mover her (I waited 2 hours though) when the paramedic arrived, within minutes he had moved her t better position to treat her.he had training to know it was ok. I don't think 62 minutes is too bad but it feels like forever when you are lying on the floor comforting someone. It's only the local press, perhaps they felt they were highlighting the cutbacks emergency services had suffered and were doing social good.

I think its fairly easy to understand.
She is an elderly woman (only on MN would someone in their 70s not be considered elderly).
She is in pain and her relatives are concerned about moving her.
Not so long ago no one would have batted an eyelid at the idea of calling an ambulance for an elderly woman in pain from unknown injuries.
Now we have competitions to see who is the most outraged about it.

Why do we feel the need to ridicule ordinary people doing ordinary things?

If my mother hurt herself I don't know if I would drive her or call an ambulance. It would depend on the circumstances. It is likely I would be far to worried about moving her to attempt to get her in my car and out again at the other end.
It is just as likely that I would help her in to the car with minimal fuss and take her to the nearest minor injuries unit.

Reasonable to call an ambulance, but also reasonable that they had to wait an hour as it's not life threatening, she was safe and with responsible adults who could have called again if her condition deteriorated.

I agree with MrsDV

We don't know any of the details of this case

Ther is little point in defining whether 74 is old or not. Some people of 74 are frail; some are not. Some have pre-existing health conditions, some do not. What we do know is that the consequences of a fall in a 74 will likely be way more serious than in someone younger

The consequences of moving someone with an un-assessed head/neck injury, or hip/femur injury could be extremely serious

Well I understand why age called an ambulance. Look at the state of her it must have been a pretty bad fall and they weren't to know it was just a broken wrist and not the hip or any internal bleeding.

An hour must seem.an age when you are frightened and in pain but as she wasn't in immediate danger I guess waiting wasn't unreasonable. After all if she had been left with breathing difficulties or a hear attack for an hour because someone broke their wrist and were seen before them they would be equally pissed off.

Sadly she would have waited hours in a &e too so least she was at home with family watching her as opposed to dumped in a hallway in hospital. And yes that happens. I spent alot of time with an elderly neighbour in hospital and being left for ages with just me with her in "spaces" was very common.

If she waited an hour for an ambulance then she wasn't classed as an emergency! I know how awful that sounds but it's true, and I say that as someone's Mum who regularly has falls (dont get me started - that's a whole other thread) .

Me and DD both have asthma and they have never been any longer than 8 minutes because they have to, and not being able to breathe is classed as a higher priority than someone who's fallen. They took ages to get to my DM when she last fell, because they kept getting calls en route to her for things like asthma attacks and cardiac arrests which they have to prioritise above falls.

Harsh i know but true. It's not the middle of winter where she was at risk of hypothermia and she's obviously not too badly injured or she'd still be in hospital.

An hour isn't long to wait, but to be fair to her she's not complaining about the ambulance crew or the NHS itself, she's complaining about the lack of funding. She actually says: "The paramedics are really pushing themselves and working hard, but it is the people at the top who need to give them more money.”

The headline and editorial slant are a bit misleading - the story is really 'Grandmother receives satisfactory emergency care, thinks paramedics need to be paid more.'

Calling the ambulance was probably not unreasonable.

Well no of course not in regards to moving them safely, bur totally unreasonable to moan complain it took over an hour. They're stretched as it is. I spoke about this in a previous thread but my 6ft built like a brick shithouse BIL was more than capable (and had experience with his own parents) of helping DM, she also has an alarm system where a falls team can come out, but she still rang an ambulance anyway. The irony of it is, my DM had refused carers after an OP, had she had them, she wouldn't have fallen, and even if she had, they'd have been there to help her. I'm guessing this lady is as stoic stubborn as my DM is in regards to needing a little help.

Gileswithachainsaw I'm 30 and fell last month having a blackout as I got out the bath. You should have seen the state of me! (and I also have various other health conditions). I didn't even ring the GP never mind an ambulance. I did get a bloody good telling off of the physio for not even getting checked over by the GP though

I really don't think this was necessary to go to the papers with even though she was in pain and discomfort.

. She actually says: "The paramedics are really pushing themselves and working hard, but it is the people at the top who need to give them more money.”

The paramedics aren't allowed to leave a patient though. Even when the first responders eventually got to my mum they were waiting with her for a good while whilst a crew became available to take her to hospital in an ambulance (she was checked and sent home within the hour on arriving at A&E).

Even when I was last taken in, they weren't allowed to leave me until the hospital had received me, which meant a couple of lovely paramedics had to wait for half an hour in a day room with a lady with breathing problems until they'd found me a bed.

On both occasions, how many callouts do you think the paramedics would have been able to do in that time?

away

I wondered this. Every admission my neighbour and i would stand there for ages with the paramedics waiting for someone to hand over too. Sometimes other people would show up too so up to three patients on those beds with 2 paramedics stood by them and no one taking these patients. And when they finally did they were moved a few feet and began waiting all over again only on their own or with family .

Such a waste of their time

Or maybe they felt 'entitled' to call an ambulance. Didn't even think of asking a neighbour, calling a taxi or shock horror driving her themselves. Some PP are using all sorts of excuses as to why they didn't do any of those things.

On another thread I talk about the sense of entitlement some people have. This is one such example.

The paramedics or ambulance crew might have moved her to the living room, for all we know.

If she's some unknown injury to her hip - they may well have not have been able to get her into the car.

It takes more bending and flexibility than you first think because most of us don't have to think about it all with an unknown injury possibly being made worse by movement.

My DH ended up an extra four days in hospital because some bright spark kept replacing the none-emergency ambulance with a taxi - their idea being he could lay on the back seats - he had a wrist injury and knee injury with frame up to his hip - the staff were keen to have the bed and he was desperate to get home - didn't have the mobility to get him into the car.

Kept happening for four days - in end ward team had quiet unofficial word with ambulance team and they got him home in early hours. It was clear he needed the ambulance as he need to be strapped to the bed to get up the steep drive and took to of them to get him up the one step. I wouldn't have been able to get him out the taxi even if that could have got him in.

The hours wait for ambulance doesn't seem that bad - though I expect to the family it felt like forever.

Hillingdon..have you had first aid training, have you called an ambulance and got advice after significant fall for a post menopausal woman. My first aid training would have said don't move her, the ambulance staff on the phone would have said don't move her, the paramedic would have assessed her and moved her.

Such a waste of their time

Yes, and that's exactly what I said to my DM, and got flamed IRL for , by the time the ambulance crew for to her, she was sat up talking and was fine and offering the paras a cuppa! So in my mind she clearly didnt need to go, but they had to take her to get her checked over anyway just because of the recent op she'd had.

On the other hand, I once had a paramedic refuse to take me during an asthma attack as he was convinced and told me so, that I was just having a panic attack I ended up sooo poorly that week and being rushed back in. Transpired said panic attack was a bad chest infection!

The paramedics have to stay with them in case they deteriorate. I think that's why anyway. It is a hard one to call though, I was talking to paramedics once during a bad episode convinced I was going to be given a neb and home within a couple of hours, imagine my blind panic suprise when they wheeled me into resus! So a person can 'look okay' when they are actually quite poorly but this doesn't seem to be the case here. Especially with the son saying they considered taking her themselves. Might have been better!

It shouldn't take 2 though. Wonder why the 2 free ones (the 2nd paramedic witg the next patient)can't go back out to the ambulance for next call and when handover is complete the other two can just pair up

My mum fell heavily onto a very hard floor recently - very fit and healthy but nearly 80. She was all for taking a bit of a breather, getting up and getting on with it. Luckily the people she was with told her to stay still and called an ambulance.

She had cracked her pelvis, though until the X-rays came through she was still claiming she'd just bruised herself and would be 'OK in a minute'.

It would have been very easy, and possibly disastrous given the severity of the injury, for a well-meaning friend to say 'Oh, I'll just pop her into the car and drive her, it's not far'

Moving doesn't tell you that much. My fil eventually manages to move and denies hurting that much for all sorts of things. On one occasion his fall was caused by a heart attack and another time a stroke but it took ages to find that out.
We don't know enough about what happened to say if it was safe to transport her.

I would agree with spikeyball that you cannot always take someone's word for how much they are hurting. My mother is extraordinarily stoical, and you have to know her quite well to understand that 'it's a bit sore' means a level of pain would have someone else writhing in agony.

My grandfather was the same . He had polio as a child, and as an elderly man broke his leg falling off a chair while putting his caliper on. He didn't make any comment about it until a few days later, because 'it didn't hurt any more than usual'.

Hillingdon

You are making as many assumptions as anyone else on here