A PENSIONER was hospitalised in a critical condition after waiting 14 hours for a response from the new NHS 111 helpline.
Diabetic and disabled, Sheila Peace, 78, was rushed to Huddersfield Royal Infirmary after the wait for an out-of-hours GP.
Her husband Geoffrey has slammed the new service, which replaced NHS Direct last month, and said: “She could have died.”
He said: “Fourteen hours is a very long time to wait. This system definitely isn’t working.”
The New Mill woman is still in intensive care at the infirmary.
Mrs Peace is the second Huddersfield pensioner to have a brush with death while waiting for advice from the new NHS phoneline.
Last week Lindley resident Bill Blackburn came close to falling into a diabetic coma after waiting 12 hours for a call back.
Geoffrey said many people were now confused about what to do when they needed a doctor.
He said his wife’s carer had become concerned she was unwell at 8am on Sunday, March 31.
They rang for an emergency doctor at Oaklands Health Centre near Holmfirth.
As it was out-of-hours they were advised to ring the new NHS service 111.
111 is being phased in to replace NHS Direct across England and Wales.
After four more chase-up calls a GP finally came to the house at 10pm that night.
Geoffrey said: “The doctor said I will stabilise her but only one hour later she was rushed to HRI by ambulance.
“She’s been on a kidney dialysis machine for four days and she’s still in intensive care.
“When I went to see her I thought she was away – she was totally out of it.
“It’s very upsetting.
“It makes people unsure what’s the best thing to do.”
Colne Valley MP Jason McCartney, whose constituency covers Lindley and New Mill, said he had written to the NHS after receiving other complaints about the service.
He said: “It’s unacceptable, I fully appreciate the woes and concerns of my constituents.
“I’ve been through it myself when calling NHS Direct for my own children and it’s terribly worrying.
“It’s clear there’s been problems with the number of calls coming in.
“Patients deserve better and my constituents deserve better.
“NHS England are urgently working with the providers of 111 to get the right number of call handlers in place and that needs to happen straight away.”
A spokeswoman for Yorkshire Ambulance Service, which runs 111 in partnership with Local Care Direct, said: “We would like to apologise for the distress caused to Mrs Peace and her family following their call to NHS 111.
“We are very keen to speak to the family about their concerns and ask that they contact us via our Patient Relations team.”
