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About: Northern Ireland Ambulance Service / Emergency ambulance response Royal Victoria Hospital / Accident & Emergency

(as the patient),

I dislocated my knee when tripping outside in the rainy and cold weather. So we rung the ambulance they said we had to wait for 1 hour and 22 minutes but this could be longer as it wasn't an emergency. Mum rang back to the ambulance service and they put us through to the manager of the service to guide us through what we had to do ourselves, to pop back the knee back  in the right place.

I was left lying outside for about 40 minutes in the freezing cold and rain in my pjs. Mum tried to cover me as best she could with blankets and coats.  Mum rang a few people to get help as she didn't want me to get hypothermia. By that stage someone from the ambulance rang back and talked my uncle through what to do after mum explained I had autism and CMT type 1a. He advised us to go to the hospital for a scan as the knee could pop out again.

So here I am sitting with mum up at A&E. I've had an xray and im left sitting around the hospital. We got here at around 11pm and now Its nearly 5.30 am and we've just been left sitting here. Some of the workers are just on their own phones or talking to the other colleagues. Massive queue and there is not many doctors about. Also one nurse taking BP and temperature. Aswell as the X Ray took 2 minutes but we've been left for hours on the doctors giving us the results. 

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Responses

Response from Neil Gillan, Co-Production & Partnership Lead, Quality, Safety & Improvement, Northern Ireland Ambulance Service 4 days ago
Neil Gillan
Co-Production & Partnership Lead, Quality, Safety & Improvement,
Northern Ireland Ambulance Service
Submitted on 02/12/2025 at 09:33
Published on Care Opinion at 09:33


picture of Neil Gillan

Good morning, charliefd

I am grateful to you for taking the time to share your experiences of the Northern Ireland Ambulance Service. I am sorry to learn that the service provided did not meet your expectations, as an organisation we are committed to consistently showing compassion, professionalism, and respect for the patients we care for.

With regards to our response times please be assured that we are working with the local Emergency Departments to try to ensure that our patients can be handed over to hospital clinical teams as quickly as possible so that ambulance are able to respond to further emergencies.

I hope you are recovering well.

Best wishes

Neil

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