"Total waste of fuel and time"

My mother has advanced alzheimer's dementia and is wheelchair bound.

She attended the plastic surgery day-surgery unit to have what is probably a squamous cell carcinoma removed from her face. She was treated impeccably by every member of staff in that unit.

Unfortunately, she had to wait for almost two hours for an ambulance to take her across the bridge to her care home. I sat with her in the porters' lodge where the ambulance staff acted like nobody can hear them talking about their working conditions. A Tayside ambulance came and collected a lady who lives in Dundee who arrived in the porters' lodge about an hour after my Mum. The staff leave at 1700, so we were left alone whilst we waited for an ambulance to drive from Glenrothes to collect Mum from Ninewells and take her across the bridge to Newport.

This is not the first time we have experienced this squabbling between the Tayside and Fife crews about whose responsibility it is to take patients from north east Fife across the bridge. In my view, it would have taken the Tayside ambulance about 15- 20 minutes in the rush hour. Instead, a two man crew from Glenrothes had to drive for over an hour to collect her and take her across the bridge.

What a total waste of fuel and time. In addition, Mum was kept waiting for an extra hour before transport arrived. This may seem trivial to you, but it is a big deal in the management of a patient with advanced dementia who is incontinent, left her home at 1200 and was not back in her home until 1830- 6. 5 hours sitting in the same incontinence pad and fasted all of that time- because we were told to rush to the porters' lodge after the surgery so that we did not miss the ambulance as the staff were due to go off duty soon. Of course, we waited nearly 2 hours. So so not good enough on so many levels.