Ambulance delay not acceptable in today's society

Published on 19th June 2008 in Letters

Sir - My name is Amanda Mcgreavy. My son Christopher was the lad featured in your article last week about the ambulance service.

Firstly, may I stress I am not in the habit of complaining lightly and this is the first time I have felt strongly enough to reply to comments in your paper. It was initially my parents who rang the paper with this complaint.

However, after reading Mrs S. Jones' comments I wish to reply.

Firstly, Mrs Jones wasn't present at the time my son was left nearly passing out with pain when he dislocated his shoulder, but another retired ambulance technician was. 

I have no complaint with the two technicians that finally arrived to attend to Christopher. They were fantastic and did what they could to get him to hospital as quickly as they could. But they themselves were shocked by the time we had waited for an ambulance and suggested we had good reason to make a complaint as they had been on station five minutes away.

We had to go to Doncaster, Scunthorpe or Hull for treatment as they felt Goole would have no one there that could deal with Christopher's injuries.

The staff at Doncaster hospital were fantastic. The sister questioned why Christopher had not been given morphine in the ambulance. She also suggested we make a formal complaint due to the time delay.

In today's society it would be seen as cruel to leave an animal lying in pain. So why does Mrs Jones thinks this is acceptable to do this to humans?

Her suggestion that an emergency doctor could treat a dislocated shoulder is a joke and I would question which part of the ambulance service she worked on.

I am well aware of the emergency services' good work, but mistakes are made and the ambulance service themselves have taken my complaint seriously and are investigating it. They admit lessons need to be learnt.

AMANDA MCGREAVY (Mrs)

Oaklands Avenue, Howden