To wonder if this doesn't upset you, nothing will

[ThirdWorld]

I've name changed for this as it's very identifying.

I live in a small village and and as a treat after a long hard day at work popped into my local pub for dinner.

Lying on the floor was an elderly woman. She was covered with a warm blanket. She had tripped and fallen at lunchtime, and obviously badly hurt herself.

An ambulance was called at 12:30, she is still lying there in the middle of the pub waiting for an ambulance.

I've obviously read about how broken our NHS is and even read the thread on here where a poster had written about her aunt who had fallen and was waiting for about 12 hours for an ambulance. But reading about it and actually seeing it for real is even more heartbreaking.

This poor old woman has been lying on a cold wooden floor for 7 hours! The owners and bar staff have been amazing and are looking after her. Well as much as they can.

I can't tell you how useless I feel. There is nothing anyone can do. The woman has obviously been refusing food or fluid in fear of wetting herself.

I know from reading the thread I mentioned previously that there is nothing anyone can do but wait.

As we left they were getting her a pad to relieve herself. In the middle of a pub!!!

This is 21st century Britain! I don't know what I'm expecting from this thread, am tempted to call the local press to see if the publicity could hurry things along, but that would probably be even more humiliating for her.

This woman has no family and is cold, miserable and in pain lying in the middle of a pub.

I just can't believe our country has fallen to this. God knows when an ambulance will arrive. She will end up getting more dehydrated and probably go into shock. And there is nothing anyone can do.

So distressing to see and my heart bleeds for the poor woman. Just prey that none of your relatives ever have a fall.

Let's hope an ambulance comes soon.

So true I have no faith at all in ambulance service and it’s scary . When my dad was having a stroke that’s what I did dial 999 as that’s what your told , only to get a call back to see if I could drive him . It was a Tia a few weeks later he had a stroke ,luckily I was there, didn’t even bother with 999 got help to get him in car and drove him .

Many people find it hard to accept the responsibility of having helped elected the right wing governments that have led us to today’s Britain, so they have to cling to the notion that the alternative would have somehow been even worse or “they’re all as bad as each other”.

I’m not a fan of Starmer as I think he will just be Tory lite - a 20 minute rest stop break rather than a Uturn - but obviously the Tories need removing or in five years it will the whole country that is poorer than Eastern Europe, rather than the current state of just significant parts of it.

In fact you have to find it laughable that that they are even trying to get re-elected: They’ve literally failed to bring about one positive thing in Britain after 13 years of office. Their current polling deficits of around 25 points flatter them hugely. In fact the conspiracy theorist might even wonder if the parliamentary Conservative party post Truss is even trying to get re-elected - or is rather trying to burn everything to the ground to the fullest extent possible before handing over a poisoned chalice to Labour?

My ex fil spent 8 hours on the floor in January with a broken hip, he sadly passed away 10 days ago. It's time something was done about the lack of ambulances, the number stuck in queues outside hospitals & the wait for ambulances.

@ThirdWorld
@Sallydimebar
well done OP, for your concern over this old lady, and Sallydimebar regarding your Dad.
A friend of mine flagged a fire engine down when her Dad was having a stroke in her car. She knew they had breathing apparatus onboard, and bless the fire crew, they stopped, gave treatment, and her Dad lived for another few years.

@Nat6999 - Im so sorry x

Anyone on this thread who’s first thought wasn’t outrage at the state of the NHS needs to shit a hedgehog.

It hurts to see how many times people have referred to the hurt, elderly woman as “the old lady” or similar. Can you imagine how you’ll feel one day when everyone around you ignores you and refers to you as “the old man” or “the old lady” as if you have no function, no being, no history? How very sad.

What a lovely person you are. Great ideas.

The exact same thing happened to my elderly auntie a few months ago. She had to lay on the pub floor while people were stepping over her. She was in too much pain to be moved, turns out she had broken her hip.

This.

I think MN should collect these NHS horror stories and publish them in a free supplement with the Telegraph. Sadly I can't take these 'big shock' MN stories seriously anymore, considering the infiltration of tabloid journo's or perhaps someone closer to home whipping up a 20 page thread fever for ad views.

It's more concerning to me that someone has posted on a public message board about this "old woman", having no family, and currently lying on a pub floor having to pee onto a pad, while patrons walk in and out. Zero dignity and incredibly outing. Being called "old" is the least troubling thing about this story.

You can blame all the ‘can’t vote labour because they don’t know what a woman is’ people, OP. Fucking wankers would rather live like this.

I'm a 999 ambulance call handler.
Really sad to hear about this lady. The waits vary dramatically - sometimes I know a patient I'm dealing with is going to wait 10plus hours, sometimes crew are there before I get off phone in 3 mins.
Obviously the biggest factor is whether the person has something that is IMMEDIATLY life threatening, that always takes priority for crews. This means people in awful pain may have to wait because right now, what they have is not life threatening (yes, I know that’s awful and not what anybody wants). The things that are most serious are not necessarily the things that hurt most!
Other factors are depending upon how busy your area is that day (eg if a big traffic accident somewhere in your patch can take lots of crews), how busy the nation is (eg Step A scare recently = thousands more calls than usual), if your call centre/service is fully staffed (many aren't of course because it is so stressful and the pay is shit). I used to pay my cleaner more per hour than I get paid now to deal with dying people on the phone sometimes.
We all know about the lack of funding nationally, the politics of the ideology of trying to force NHS towards private etc but what I think many people won't know is the ridiculous amount of time wasting that goes on from the great British public- it shocked me when I started this job, much worse than I expected. We joke we are the ambulance Uber Service! People phone for very minor things expecting an ambulance when they could just be taken by a relative or get a taxi or have no need to go to hospital at all. (Not the lady in the pub of course). They usually wouldn’t get an ambulance but sometimes they do. People phone us - the EMERGENCY ambulance service (the clue is in the name), because they got bored waiting for 111 or their GP to answer the phone. People think they will jump the queues at A&E because they arrive in an ambulance instead of just going by car for non emergency things -
they won’t . And of course we get the repeat callers – some people phone us literally hundreds of times a week. Even though we know they are almost certainly wasting our time, we can’t just hang up, we have to deal with them and triage them in case this time they really need us. The lack of funding
for all the services is the biggest issue of course but some better public education of what NHS services to use for what and when to just sensibly help yourself at home would take some pressure off resource for the people who really do need it most in my personal view.

It’s a awful spilt decision to make do you wait or go not knowing what could happen on journey. I was lucky as pain tingling started in his leg so he was breathing and talking fine . Unlike Tia where his speech went all funny .
We had been warned after Tia you are highly likely to have a stroke so I was sort of expecting it . A bleed was found on brain but thankfully made a full recovery and very thankful for the NHS stroke team who were great . Great thinking for the fire brigade , glad they could help .

Really hope the lady gets treatment soon Op. As pp said I think so many ambulances are left waiting to hand over at hospitals , it has a big delay .

Have they been ringing for updates? My mum fell on the ice recently and broke her arm and was laying on the ice for maybe 2 hours (she wouldn't let us touch her due to the pain) I kept ringing them as they were taking so long and i honestly thought she was going to freeze to death, anyway I eventually told them she was losing consciousness even though she wasn't just to speed them up... the they guy went oh ok I'll send someone now!!! I was fuming but they came pretty quickly after that

Its all very well saying that but people still have to make a living. That's not being selfish its just life.

Bless her absolutely sickening

It's not pot luck

Simplified
You've got 3 ambulances
4 calls. 1 is the person on the floor, 1 is a cardiac arrest, 1 is a child fitting and the other is bleeding heavily. Person on the floor doesn't get an ambulance
Ambulance becomes available, but now there are 2 more calls, 1 for a stabbing and 1 for a hanging
So now you've got the woman on the floor still waiting and the stabbing. Next ambulance goes to the stabbing. Another 3 calls come in...

You can see how even though she needs an ambulance, other people are taking priority and with delays handing patients over it ties ambulances up even more

Yes the NHS is in a dire state. But preventable cases like this aren't going to help it...An elderly woman was in a pub by herself. Why was she in a pub by herself? If she's that fragile shouldn't she be in a care home or at home with a carer? We're quick to say about how much of a strain on the NHS smokers and drinkers are but surely we can prevent the amount of "elderly person falls over" cases too?

Meltinthemiddle Labour buying up unused theatre slots & beds in private hospitals worked brilliantly, I had 5 operations within a year under it. I wish they did emergency care because everything was well organised, the wards were clean, the staff had time for patients, pain relief was given straight away, no waiting hours for it to be signed off by a doctor.

I'm going to assume you have said this in order to get a reaction and not because you are hard of thinking.

Toss is about right.

Have a word with yourself.

Fucking hell, you surely cannot be serious?

Elderly women! Stay AWAY from the pub! Yes, that means you, old lady. STAND BACK.