In the final episode of the current series of BBC Ambulance, paramedic Jeff was left in tears after a call that struck a personal chord. The Castleford crew member and his colleague Eddie attended a 51-year-old man named Dale who was struggling with dialysis and unable to move.
Dale's mother told the crew her son had been drowsy, suffering chest pain and vomiting all morning. After checks, Jeff warned that Dale could have gone into cardiac arrest if left longer. The pair rushed him to hospital for immediate treatment.
Later, while sitting in the ambulance, Jeff broke down and admitted the incident was 'quite close to home' because his own father had died from renal failure. He struggled to control his emotions and stepped out of the vehicle to compose himself.
Returning to the ambulance, Jeff explained to Eddie that his father, a British national living in South Africa, passed away during the COVID pandemic, meaning he could not travel to see him. 'I think as a bloke sometimes emotionally we don't deal with what's going on in the background,' he said, adding that his father's death had been 'life changing'.
The episode concluded with a text revealing that Dale died six months later after a long illness and multiple hospital admissions.
