Lincoln A&E: Heart failure patient waited for 26 hours

A 70-year-old woman with stage four heart failure has said she has been left "traumatised" after waiting 26 hours in a porter's chair in A&E.

Lesley Rose said she was admitted in the morning of 21 February to Lincoln's A&E department and was eventually seen on the following evening.

She said: "It's dangerous, the whole system needs to be looked at."

The NHS trust which runs the hospital has apologised for the longer than usual wait times.

Ms Rose said she was admitted to Lincoln County Hospital's A&E following symptoms of heart failure by another hospital department.

"I lost track of time. I was waiting on average 26 hours. Luckily the porter left me a chair, which meant I always had a seat."

She said in that time she "didn't go to sleep" for fear of not hearing her name being called out by staff.

"If you go to sleep the likelihood is you're going to fall off [the seat]. So I did maintain being awake. I think it must've been adrenaline.

"I don't like looking back on it because I feel it traumatises me.

"A part of me can't believe it and I keep looking at my paperwork thinking 'was it really that long?'"

United Lincolnshire Hospitals NHS Trust said it had "experienced significant demand" for its emergency care services.

"We are sorry to those who have experienced longer waits than usual, but would like to reassure that our clinical teams continue to work tirelessly to ensure those who need immediate emergency care are able to be seen," a spokesperson said.

They said the trust had made significant progress in the wait times of our urgent and emergency care pathways" since February.

"In April, we recorded improvements to ambulance handover times, a reduction in the number of patients waiting more than 12 hours, and 74% of all patients in our emergency departments or urgent treatments centres were seen within four hours."

The trust urged people to use alternative services such as GP, pharmacy or NHS 111 for non-emergency help.

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