A 47-year-old woman died after waiting nearly six hours for an ambulance following a fall outside her home in Cwmaman, south Wales. Donna Gilby broke her foot and was left on a cold pavement, covered by neighbours and relatives with coats and blankets, before being taken to hospital where she later suffered a cardiac arrest.
Gilby’s father, Gareth Gilby, said she tripped getting out of her car shortly before 8am on Tuesday. Despite multiple calls to the ambulance service, reporting that she was slipping in and out of consciousness, help did not arrive until shortly before 2pm. She was taken to Prince Charles Hospital in Merthyr Tydfil, where she died in the early hours of Wednesday.
The Welsh Ambulance Service has launched an investigation. Chief executive Jason Killens expressed condolences and apologised for the delayed response, attributing it to an increase in high-priority red calls and significant hospital handover delays affecting the entire unscheduled care system.
Gareth Gilby said: “I still can’t believe she’s gone. I’m in shock. We’ve got an 11-year-old girl here now without a mother. It shouldn’t have happened.”
