SAM ROWLANDS, Member of the Welsh Parliament for North Wales, has called for more to be done to bring down waiting times in hospital A&E departments.
Speaking in the Senedd, Mr Rowlands, Shadow Health Minister, highlighted the case of one of his constituents who waited 27 hours in A&E while experiencing severe chest pains.
He said: “I’m grateful to you, First Minister, for acknowledging that that’s not acceptable and that we need to see that change. The whole system needs a certain level of concentration and effort to change.
“But there is some good news and there are other organisations, whether they’re third sector or private sector, who have the capacity and are willing and able to provide support and capacity to unblock some of these blockages that we’re seeing at the moment.
“But they’re sharing with me that they’re experiencing, here in Wales, some unique resistance to engaging with these other sectors, so that those blocks can be unblocked very, very quickly.”
Mr Rowlands asked the First Minister, Eluned Morgan, for a statement to outline the Welsh Government’s commitment to working both cross-sector and cross-border to ensure that capacity is created, so that patients aren’t waiting for these undue lengths of time in A&E.
The Minister said: “I’m not aware that there is that difficulty, and if you’ve got any evidence to support that, I’d be grateful if you could send it on to the Cabinet Secretary.”
Mr Rowlands added: “The whole situation remains extremely concerning and all too often we are told horror stories about people having to wait far too long in A&E departments.
“Unfortunately hearing from my colleague that 11 out of the 12 ambulances in Carmarthenshire were actually waiting outside Glangwili hospital to admit patients is too familiar a story.
