AN ELDERLY woman was forced to lie on the pavement for more than four hours as she waited for an ambulance after suffering a nasty fall.
Kathleen Bryson, 80, was pictured on the ground wrapped up in blankets after concerned neighbours rushed to the OAP’s side.
Kathleen lies on the ground wrapped in blankets while waiting Credit: submitted
The ambulance took over four hours to take Kathleen back to University Hospital of North Durham (stock) Credit: Alamy
Kathleen fell outside her home in County Durham at 11.20am on Monday morning and was unable to move due to her age and the pain from the landing.
At 3.30pm, she was still lying in almost the exact same position on the pavement waiting for medical help.
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Speaking to ChronicleLive at the time, Kathleen’s son, Karl Bryson, said: “It’s been nearly three hours that she’s been lying on the concrete floor.
“She’s just lying there in the same position. She’s 80 years old.”
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Karl was doing some gardening work when he received a call from his sister saying their mum had had a fall.
They believe she may have tripped on a pothole in the pavement.
When he arrived, neighbours had already contacted the North East Ambulance Service and Karl waited almost an hour before calling back at 12.10pm.
When no ambulance had arrived by 2pm, Karl and a neighbour called back for an update.
At this point the wait had exceeded two hours, which he says he was told would be the maximum time Kathleen would have to wait.
However, the pain continued until 3.34pm when an ambulance eventually arrived on scene to assist Kathleen, according to service logs.
Vicky Court, deputy chief operating officer for North East Ambulance Service, said: “We are sorry for the delay experienced by Ms Bryson and for the distress this has caused her and her family.
“We recognise that Ms Bryson waited far longer than we would like and this is not the service we would have wanted to provide for her.
“Our teams work hard to respond to patients as quickly as possible, but at times of high demand, our resources must always be prioritised by clinical need for patients whose lives are immediately in danger.
“We will review this incident and would encourage Ms Bryson or her family to contact our patient experience team through our formal complaints process so that the circumstances can be fully investigated and we can feed back to her directly.”
