"Ambulance Response."

My Mother-in-law pressed her Life-Link button late one night which alerted us to find out that she had a fall on the way to bed. After picking her up, although she said she was ok we could see that she was having 'funny turns' on a regular basis, these turns made her almost pass out or feint. I called the 111 service for advice around 12.45am and was assured a doctor would ring back. By 02.15am we had still not received a call from a doctor so I decided to ring 999.

By 03.20 we had still not received an ambulance so I rang 999 again to be told that the call would be upgraded to urgent. By 3.45am I was considering taking my mother-in-law to the hospital myself as she was still having these turns. At 03.50 a Paramedic arrived who was very considerate and understanding and after about an hour of a very thorough examination and a number of ECG's he called for an ambulance to take her to hospital for further investigation.

Where I was very impressed with both the Paramedic and the Ambulance staff, I was very disappointed in the response timing of both the Doctor call back of the 111 service and the response time of the Paramedic attendance. I think waiting over 90 minutes after an emergency call is totally unacceptable, I understand it was a Saturday night and no doubt the service was busy but the whole incident could have resulted in a much bleaker outcome.