Ambulance took an hour to go to aid of Benfleet woman who had cut an artery (From Southend Standard)

Looks like the NHS has decided to cut the death rate in their hospitals by ensuring sick people never reach there alive in the first place...

As for the Mid Staffs NHS Trust scandal: “Corporate interests and cost cutting being put before safety caused unnecessary suffering and death”. An unhealthy obsession by managers with targets and ‘performance’ which effectively destroyed the vocational culture in the organisation.

We have been saying this about policing for the last five years and no one listens.

The target driven performance culture in the ambulance service is insane, relentless and unbelievably stupid and pointless. We have an entire generation of senior managers who know nothing about anything except delivering ‘performance’ which has nothing to do with ambulance work. Now we are disconnected from the public, delivering a rubbish service and totally unable to respond because no one above the rank of Duty Operations Manager knows any different.

Should had arrived in 30 MINUTES now that is a laugh,was it ther tea break
or something like that !!!

Echo, please chase this up. The ambulance was supposed to arrive in 30 mins but no explaination as to why it did not.
Not long now till we read that late arrival of an ambulance will be the cause of death for some poor soul. I just hope it's not me or any one of my family.

Admitted it should have arrived - no apology - no explanation. What a sad state our NHS is in. And what is Jeremy Hunt doing - nothing he refers it all to local - and do we have control over local decisions - no.
in today's Echo is states that now a handful of GPs will decide on whether blood tests are done at Bedford. Sounds to me that the others have passed the buck. It also states that the decision may be sent to jeremy hunt to make. please dont. Time for everyone to write to jeremy hunt and the handful of Drs who have been made a sub committee to decide. We must not lose our local facilities.

What a Disgrace, let the ambulance service hold their heads in shame, when they do turn up they just do so, as if they are doing us all a favour, they need to be held accountable, good job they're not the Fire Service.

Spirit of Kings Park wrote:
As for the Mid Staffs NHS Trust scandal: “Corporate interests and cost cutting being put before safety caused unnecessary suffering and death”. An unhealthy obsession by managers with targets and ‘performance’ which effectively destroyed the vocational culture in the organisation.

We have been saying this about policing for the last five years and no one listens.

The target driven performance culture in the ambulance service is insane, relentless and unbelievably stupid and pointless. We have an entire generation of senior managers who know nothing about anything except delivering ‘performance’ which has nothing to do with ambulance work. Now we are disconnected from the public, delivering a rubbish service and totally unable to respond because no one above the rank of Duty Operations Manager knows any different.

Very well said! It is the time of the penguins, when these vindictive "waddlers" in suits move about making squawking noises and leaving bird droppings on every thing they encounter. High profits, low labour costs is all they want to see. "Captains of Industry" moved all their production to sweat shops abroad and now their politico's bemoan the fact that too many people have not got a job. Sell of Council houses, do not use the money made to build more, then we have a housing crisis.
When are we going to return to the days of keeping everyone gainfully employed and put paid to this absolute stupidity!

Devils Advocate wrote:

Spirit of Kings Park wrote:
As for the Mid Staffs NHS Trust scandal: “Corporate interests and cost cutting being put before safety caused unnecessary suffering and death”. An unhealthy obsession by managers with targets and ‘performance’ which effectively destroyed the vocational culture in the organisation.

We have been saying this about policing for the last five years and no one listens.

The target driven performance culture in the ambulance service is insane, relentless and unbelievably stupid and pointless. We have an entire generation of senior managers who know nothing about anything except delivering ‘performance’ which has nothing to do with ambulance work. Now we are disconnected from the public, delivering a rubbish service and totally unable to respond because no one above the rank of Duty Operations Manager knows any different.

Very well said! It is the time of the penguins, when these vindictive "waddlers" in suits move about making squawking noises and leaving bird droppings on every thing they encounter. High profits, low labour costs is all they want to see. "Captains of Industry" moved all their production to sweat shops abroad and now their politico's bemoan the fact that too many people have not got a job. Sell of Council houses, do not use the money made to build more, then we have a housing crisis.
When are we going to return to the days of keeping everyone gainfully employed and put paid to this absolute stupidity!

What a Disgrace, let the ambulance service hold their heads in shame, when they do turn up they just do so, as if they are doing us all a favour, they need to be held accountable, good job they're not the Fire Service.

Since when was a cut artery non-life threatening only requiring a 20 to 30 minute response time? The ambulance crew were apparently treating it as a Category A life threatening response if they arrived under emergency conditions - response time target 8 minutes. That's a serious failing and deserves a much closer examination.

The ambulance service management should be subjected to an in depth investigation.

Audioman wrote:
Should had arrived in 30 MINUTES now that is a laugh,was it ther tea break
or something like that !!!

Not sure where you get your information from for you to make a comment like that???
Ambulance staff like the Police are extremely short staffed at the moment and unfortunately the worst is yet to come.

Ambulance crews get a 30 min break during a 12 hour shift (that normally ends up being 13 or 14+ hours) even then they are put under pressure to respond during that break time which incidently is unpaid and therefore the crews own time. If you see a crew getting a cup of tea of heaven forbid using a toilet outside of that break time is that such a crime?? A 9 to 5 office shift with an hours lunch and tea and cigarette breaks during the day seems a luxury in comparision!

The public need to be aware that the Ambulance Service is facing huge cuts which are already being put in place, there are increasingly limited resources for a rapidly expanding population.

It is totally wrong for this patient to be waiting so long for a potentially life threatening emergency but the blame does not lie at the hands of the frontline crews themselves as a few of the posters on here like to suggest.
The blame can be aimed at the previous Labour Government, the existing ConDem Government, people using the Ambulance Service inappropriately worsening the shortages, bankers for putting the country in this financial mess leading to cuts needing to be made and upper management within the service.

But no matter who is to blame, frontline cuts ARE being made and the only people who can REALLY make a difference is the general public - speak to your MP and demand the cuts stop to help prevent incidents like this happening again.

Carnabackable wrote:
What a Disgrace, let the ambulance service hold their heads in shame, when they do turn up they just do so, as if they are doing us all a favour, they need to be held accountable, good job they're not the Fire Service.

Not sure where you get your experience of ambulance staff turning up as if they are doing you a favour but I'm sure and hope it is not a general reflection of front line staff attitude. With regards to your fire service comment it is like comparing chalk and cheese. An emergency ambulance in just one 12 hour shift will probably respond to as many 999 calls as the whole of your local fire station will in a week. One ambulance station in a 24 hour period will respond to as many 999 calls as the whole of the Essex Fire Service in a week (look it up !). You get a good response from the Fire Service because they are well resourced, not understaffed and well trained (because they have the time to do training). The ambulance service is underfunded, understaffed and staff often do training in their own time, voluntarily, because they cannot be spared from manning the vehicles You get what what you pay for.

Carnabackable wrote:
What a Disgrace, let the ambulance service hold their heads in shame, when they do turn up they just do so, as if they are doing us all a favour, they need to be held accountable, good job they're not the Fire Service.

You really are a tw@t

Thekingofsouthend wrote:

Carnabackable wrote:
What a Disgrace, let the ambulance service hold their heads in shame, when they do turn up they just do so, as if they are doing us all a favour, they need to be held accountable, good job they're not the Fire Service.

You really are a tw@t

The truth hurts, the tw@t is you

About time they had a health Commissioner to sort out this mis-managed rabble, into a service to be proud of, high times heads rolled, when an incident of this severity, occurs..

Walt Jabsco wrote:

Audioman wrote:
Should had arrived in 30 MINUTES now that is a laugh,was it ther tea break
or something like that !!!

Not sure where you get your information from for you to make a comment like that???
Ambulance staff like the Police are extremely short staffed at the moment and unfortunately the worst is yet to come.

Ambulance crews get a 30 min break during a 12 hour shift (that normally ends up being 13 or 14+ hours) even then they are put under pressure to respond during that break time which incidently is unpaid and therefore the crews own time. If you see a crew getting a cup of tea of heaven forbid using a toilet outside of that break time is that such a crime?? A 9 to 5 office shift with an hours lunch and tea and cigarette breaks during the day seems a luxury in comparision!

The public need to be aware that the Ambulance Service is facing huge cuts which are already being put in place, there are increasingly limited resources for a rapidly expanding population.

It is totally wrong for this patient to be waiting so long for a potentially life threatening emergency but the blame does not lie at the hands of the frontline crews themselves as a few of the posters on here like to suggest.
The blame can be aimed at the previous Labour Government, the existing ConDem Government, people using the Ambulance Service inappropriately worsening the shortages, bankers for putting the country in this financial mess leading to cuts needing to be made and upper management within the service.

But no matter who is to blame, frontline cuts ARE being made and the only people who can REALLY make a difference is the general public - speak to your MP and demand the cuts stop to help prevent incidents like this happening again.

High time the ambulance service, and remember that word, SERVICE, started to attend emergencies within an acceptable time frame, please stop quoting the lunch and tea breaks, the cuts and all the other popular excuses,do you honestly think that if there was a house fire, it would take Trumpton an hour to arrive.
Heads need to roll, over this fiasco.

Carnabackable wrote:

Walt Jabsco wrote:

Audioman wrote:
Should had arrived in 30 MINUTES now that is a laugh,was it ther tea break
or something like that !!!

Not sure where you get your information from for you to make a comment like that???
Ambulance staff like the Police are extremely short staffed at the moment and unfortunately the worst is yet to come.

Ambulance crews get a 30 min break during a 12 hour shift (that normally ends up being 13 or 14+ hours) even then they are put under pressure to respond during that break time which incidently is unpaid and therefore the crews own time. If you see a crew getting a cup of tea of heaven forbid using a toilet outside of that break time is that such a crime?? A 9 to 5 office shift with an hours lunch and tea and cigarette breaks during the day seems a luxury in comparision!

The public need to be aware that the Ambulance Service is facing huge cuts which are already being put in place, there are increasingly limited resources for a rapidly expanding population.

It is totally wrong for this patient to be waiting so long for a potentially life threatening emergency but the blame does not lie at the hands of the frontline crews themselves as a few of the posters on here like to suggest.
The blame can be aimed at the previous Labour Government, the existing ConDem Government, people using the Ambulance Service inappropriately worsening the shortages, bankers for putting the country in this financial mess leading to cuts needing to be made and upper management within the service.

But no matter who is to blame, frontline cuts ARE being made and the only people who can REALLY make a difference is the general public - speak to your MP and demand the cuts stop to help prevent incidents like this happening again.

High time the ambulance service, and remember that word, SERVICE, started to attend emergencies within an acceptable time frame, please stop quoting the lunch and tea breaks, the cuts and all the other popular excuses,do you honestly think that if there was a house fire, it would take Trumpton an hour to arrive.
Heads need to roll, over this fiasco.

I understand that you are unhappy with the recent performance of the ambulance service, however you cannot tell people to stop quoting the lunch breaks, cuts and "all the other popular excuses" (whatever they may be). It is a undeniable fact that cuts (£50 million) are causing problems with response times. Because of the budget cuts staff are working longer and harder with increasing demand and that will also have an effect on the quality of service provided. You cannot compare the ambulance service with the Fire Service as you have done again here. There really is no comparison regarding the amount of staff to amount of calls ratio. ( as I explained in your previous post on this subject). The funding, equipment and training time of the Fire Service are in a different league to the ambulance service and I am glad of that, because the Fire Service are an example of how a properly funded, equipped and manned emergency service can provide a great service. I just wish the ambulance service were treated the same .