National Hell Service: NHS ambulance staff missing key response time targets for heart attack and stroke patients in all but one areas of England

By Liam On Apr 23, 2024

Ambulances are missing response time targets for potential heart or stroke victims in all but one local authority in England, damning figures have revealed.

Paramedics should arrive at the scene of these calls within 18 minutes, but some time-critical patients may have to wait longer than a day.

Windsor and Maidenhead were the only ones out of 194 areas to meet the target for so-called ‘Category 2’ calls last year, with an average time of just over 16 minutes.

Cornwall performed the worst, with an average wait time of one hour and nine minutes – almost four times longer than necessary.

This was followed by patients in West Devon, who had to wait an average of just over an hour, and South Hams with an average wait of 59 minutes.

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The figures were obtained by the Liberal Democrats, who sent Freedom of Information requests to all ten ambulance trusts in England.

The party warned that patients are being made to ‘suffer unnecessarily’ and can no longer trust that an ambulance will arrive in time for a loved one at the time of need.

In one alarming case, a patient in Warrington waited 25 hours and 40 minutes for an ambulance to arrive following a Category 2 call, 85 times longer than the 18 minute target.

Other long waits included delays of 25 hours and 27 minutes in Staffordshire and Stoke on Trent and 22 hours and 52 minutes in East Lancashire.

What do the latest NHS performance figures show?

The total waiting list shrank by 40,000 to 7.54 million in February.

There were 252 people wait more than two years to start treatment in late February, down from 376 in January.

The number of people waiting over a year The number of people requiring hospital treatment was 305,050, slightly lower than the 321,394 in the previous month.

About 42,968 people had to wait more than 12 hours in emergency departments in England in March. The figure is lower than the 44,417 recorded in February.

A total of 140,181 people waited at least four hours of admission decision in March, up from 139,458 in February.

Only 74.2 percent of patients were seen within four hours at A&Es last month. NHS standards require 76 percent to be admitted, transferred or discharged within four hours.

The average in March Category one response time – calls from people with life-threatening illnesses or injuries – lasted 8 minutes and 20 seconds. The target time is seven minutes.

It took an average of 33 minutes and 50 seconds for ambulances to respond category two callssuch as burns, epilepsy and strokes. This is more than twice as long as the target of 18 minutes.

Response times for category three calls – such as late stages of labour, non-severe burns and diabetes – on average 2 hours, 29 minutes and 48 seconds. Nine out of ten ambulances should arrive to these calls within two hours.

In addition, 173 of the 194 areas did not meet the seven-minute response time for life-threatening ‘Category 1’ calls, where a patient’s heart has stopped or is not breathing.

Mid Devon and West Devon had the worst average response times for Category 1 calls, with both more than double the seven-minute target.

Worryingly, a patient in Oldham waited 11 hours and 44 minutes for an ambulance to arrive for a Category 1 call.

In the 165 areas that provided complete data, nine in 10 reported an increase in average ambulance response times for Category 2 calls since 2019.

Thirteen areas saw average response times more than double over this period, with the biggest increase of 141 per cent in Plymouth.

Waiting times had increased from 24 minutes to 57 minutes.

Liberal Democrat Health and Social Care spokesperson Daisy Cooper said: ‘Calling an ambulance when you or a loved one is in a serious emergency is one of the most distressing times of anyone’s life.

‘The least people deserve is the knowledge that an ambulance can reach them on time. Unfortunately, too often that doesn’t happen, as these devastating figures show.

‘This Conservative government has overseen the complete decimation of local NHS services.

‘Under the Conservative Party, the health service has suffered inexcusable neglect, and it is patients who are bearing the brunt.

‘We urgently need investment in our ambulance services. For too long, staff have not been given the resources they need and patients have had to suffer unnecessarily.”

Rory Deighton, director of the NHS Confederation’s acute network, blamed the slow flow of patients through A&E for contributing to long waiting times, with ambulance staff unable to immediately drop off patients and respond to new to call to action.

He said there have been recent improvements, adding: ‘Healthcare leaders know ambulance services are under immense pressure.

‘Call handlers are receiving an increasing number of calls, including calls that are life-threatening or emergency, while ambulance teams and their emergency department colleagues work together to tackle long transfer delays in hospitals.

‘Ambulance leaders know there is still a long way to go to meet response targets and are working incredibly hard to ensure the improvements we are seeing are sustained in the long term.’

A spokesperson for the Department of Health and Social Services said there had been ‘major improvements’ in ambulance response times this year.

They added: ‘We committed an additional £200 million last year, alongside new ambulances, to further expand capacity and improve response times, and the Government is providing the NHS with record funding of almost £165 billion per year. Parliament, alongside record numbers of doctors and nurses.’