Ambulance response times slated (From South Wales Guardian)

Ambulance response times slated

4:00pm Friday 28th September 2012 in Ammanford news

AMBULANCE response times in Llandovery show no signs of improving, local councillors have reported.

They maintain the Towy Valley town is bottom of the queue when it comes to ambulance callouts – despite having an ambulance station in the town.

They were commenting after figures obtained earlier thismonthshowedthe worst average 999 response times by paramedics were to patients fromthe Llandovery area, who have to wait an average of 32 minutes for a response.

Crews are supposed to aim for a response time of eight minutes or less for blue light calls, classified as Category A, with a target of 65 per cent of calls answered within this time.

Members of the town council had previously expressed concerns about ambulance cover – claiming that a Llandoverybased crew were dispatched to stand-by near Brecon on a regular basis.

Now Cllr Gill Wright has again expressed dissatisfaction with the Welsh Ambulance Service, months after Cllr Robin Ennion spoke of the “unacceptable delay” in treating a pedestrian who had collapsed in Market Square.

“Someone collapsed in the Co-op car park recently and it took one hour and 50 minutes for an ambulance to get there,” she said. “Llandovery has the worst ambulance response times of the lot.”

Cllr Ennion was similarily concerned. “Anumber of Llandovery people are being failed by the WelshAmbulance Service in their hour of need,” he said.

A Welsh Ambulance Service spokeswoman said: “We make every effort to use our resouces effectively to respond to all calls and incidents across Wales as quickly as we can.

“Responding to incidents in more rural areas can be challenging, which is why we continue to develop and implement initiatives such as Community First Responder and Public Access Defibrillator schemes across Wales, particularly in the more remote areas.”