One rule for the rich!

[Areyou4real]

Richard Madeley felt a bit ill and what did North Wales NHS say?
“We sent a paramedic in a rapid-response car and an emergency ambulance to the scene, and one patient was taken to hospital.”
Yet my friends 87 year old mum was left lying in the street for 5 hours with a fractured pelvis before an ambulance arrived.
It make me sick!

I doubt very much poor person on control that night just happens think oh well let’s ignore the 3 red calls waiting and divert. Come on give NhS staff some credit. It’s on clinical need first come first served. No waits is just lucky on day with hospitals over run as they are

If you've ever watched the Ambulance fly on the wall documentary programmes, you'd understand how these things are prioritised plus the pressure the service is under and what a nightmare it is for the operators.

Is it ideal? No. However, you have no idea what the circumstances were for Richard Madeley or what the particular night was like for pressure on the service.

Of course it made a difference who the patient was and anyone denying that is being contrary for the sake of it.

Yes, I'm sure they have a list of the names of priority patients on every screen in the control centre.

@2020isnotbehaving

I doubt very much poor person on control that night just happens think oh well let’s ignore the 3 red calls waiting and divert. Come on give NhS staff some credit. It’s on clinical need first come first served. No waits is just lucky on day with hospitals over run as they are

I give NHS staff lots of credit as I am a Senior Nurse in a hospital and it is not the NHS I joined many years ago.

Richard Madeley “I started to feel briefly unwell in the small hours of the morning and was taken to hospital as a precaution,” he said.

This is pretty much exactly what my dad said when he was having a heart attack.

Of course it's to do with being a celebrity

Someone from the show would have called the ambulance service and said who it was - the nhs call centre wouldn't have wanted bad publicity so they'd have prioritised the ambulance

At triage he may not have been treated differently but of course the ambulance would have been dispatched quickly

I agree with you OP

Surely there is a doc on site who would have made the call?

I think you’ve misunderstood op, ambulances are sent out based on risk to life, whatever was wrong with Richard it was reported the other cast members were distressed by it, so it clearly seemed serious at the time and he’s downplayed it

I’m sorry about your relative, sometimes things do take long, a fractured pelvis from a fall can take hours to get an ambulance, I was at an event where it took several hours to get to an elderly lady who fell, and had the same injury, and it was clear that thr ambulances were prioritised to those who risked death, the disconnect you habe is she was on the street risking hypothermia, so it was a risk to life and something went wrong

But with limited information I don’t think you can just assume and it’s not a rich or poor thing, that’s not how the ambulance service work, they do not prioritise wealthy people.

People are being contrary for the sake of it. Of course he was prioritised because he's a celeb on a TV show.🙄

Unless both calls were made in the same area at exactly the same time, and you have a copy of the service's prioritisation criteria and have listened to the calls and can see that your friends Mum should have been clinically prioritised higher than Richard Madeley and was not, with him jumping her in the queue, then you can't assume that the difference was "one rule for the rich".

@girlmom21

Richard Madeley “I started to feel briefly unwell in the small hours of the morning and was taken to hospital as a precaution,” he said.

This is pretty much exactly what my dad said when he was having a heart attack.

The papers are full of people who were having heart attacks but waited for ever for an ambulance because they are not famous. www.independent.co.uk/news/health/ambulance-patient-heart-attack-death-b1959634.html www.shropshirestar.com/news/health/2021/11/03/patient-says-delayed-ambulances-should-advise-people-to-get-to-hospital-themselves/

Clearly yabu.

There are a finite number of ambulances.

How long they take to come depends on how many calls there are & how serious the calls are.

When your friends mum was in the street with a fractured pelvis, the ambulances will have been occupied with people dying. Babies blue unable to breathe. People mid heart attack.

He will either have been in a potentially critical condition OR when he happened to call, the ambulances just werent very busy.

I suspect (don't know for sure) the ambulance may be paid for by the production company as all events over a certain size need to pay for first aid including paramedics and ambulance if deemed risky. Their insurance too may require it.

@DeepaBeesKit

Clearly yabu.

There are a finite number of ambulances.

How long they take to come depends on how many calls there are & how serious the calls are.

When your friends mum was in the street with a fractured pelvis, the ambulances will have been occupied with people dying. Babies blue unable to breathe. People mid heart attack.

He will either have been in a potentially critical condition OR when he happened to call, the ambulances just werent very busy.

Read the post above yours

@Areyou4real those articles are about different ambulance services, and in a different country to where he was...

I think you're being absurd but clearly you don't care about the facts. Keep being mad.

Why not just be happy that they were responsive to an ill man who is now fortunately home and well?

@GreenLunchBox

People are being contrary for the sake of it. Of course he was prioritised because he's a celeb on a TV show.🙄

I'm pretty sure that's not a criteria for prioritisation. They literally follow a list of clinical symptoms which decide the priority of the call, and the order in which an ambulance will be dispatched. And response times will vary day to day, hour to hour, depending on how busy the service is.

@googlegoode

Surely there is a doc on site who would have made the call?

Of course there was but we're not doing logic here today.

@Lemonjiffy

A fractured pelvis in anyone let alone an elderly person is extremely serious. Of course it made a difference who the patient was and anyone denying that is being contrary for the sake of it.

Well said. People are blind to what is happening to ordinary people.

YABU. You have no idea what was wrong with him, how long he waited for the paramedic or how busy the service was that day.

@girlmom21

They were probably much busier when she had her injury and her injury wasn't life threatening. For all we know he could have been having chest pains or something that could suggest a blood clot, heart attack, brain tumour.

If they're only 5 minutes from the hospital, surely by your logic someone could have just taken her in the car?

Taken her in the car? With a fractured pelvis.

1. The advice from ambulance would have been not to move the patient
2. I suspect it would have been too painful for the patient to even attempt to move let alone get up and in a car.

My guess would have been he either passed out and it went through as query not breathing so was a category 1 or at his age chest pain. Those are immediately life threatening a broken hip although painful isn't. We all need to appreciate the NHS a bit more, yes it under pressure but we also abuse it which causes delays when we really need it

@NEbotherpet that's why I said by the OP's logic. Her logic is massively flawed in every sense so I'm not actually suggesting it should have happened

I am surprised it was NHS is all.
Thought the production company were indemnified/insured for all emergencies and had a BUPA-style set up.
Could be they do but private/NHS liaise.
Not question of celebrity but private provision? Because - and I didn't see it - sticking a 65 year old head first into mouldy fruit and veg makes them liable. Same as Freddy Starr eating a fermented egg.
Production company will still be liable for illness and fatalities regardless of disclaimers and contracts signed with waivers, they have an enhanced duty of care.

@vickyc90

My guess would have been he either passed out and it went through as query not breathing so was a category 1 or at his age chest pain. Those are immediately life threatening a broken hip although painful isn't. We all need to appreciate the NHS a bit more, yes it under pressure but we also abuse it which causes delays when we really need it

A fractured pelvis IS life threatening it may involve damage to other organs and until seen it would not be known