War hero left for 34 hours on trolley at scandal-hit hospital
AN 89-YEAR-OLD war hero taken to hospital because he could not get an appointment with his GP was forced to wait in an ambulance for 32 hours.
David Walters, who had a temperature and was getting delirious, only went to the accident and emergency unit after his local surgery said he could not be seen for five days.
His family rang for an ambulance and after a five-hour wait, he was taken to the A&E department.
But his relatives said after spending two hours in A&E, he had to wait a further two hours in the ambulance while waiting for a bed at the Princess of Wales Hospital in Bridgend, South Wales.
The ex-Royal Navy seaman’s ordeal came just weeks after he was awarded an Ushakov medal by Russia for service on the deadly Arctic convoys during the Second World War.
Yesterday Mr Walters’ granddaughter Jodie Rowlands said: “He wasn’t able to recognise his family and friends.
"It was only after an old friend, who is a retired heart surgeon, saw him and said he needed to go to hospital that anything happened.
“He had to wait for 34 hours in A&E.
"He was taken inside in the first two hours to be assessed, but he was then taken back out to the ambulance.
“He was 34 hours on a trolley, and he received no tests or treatment, other than being given some paracetamol.”
Mr Walters, of Cymmer, Swansea, was released from hospital after a short time on a ward and is now being cared for by his family.
The Princess of Wales Hospital is currently at the centre of a police probe.
Five nurses have been charged with falsifying medical records and wilful neglect.
A spokesman for Abertawe Bro Morgannwg University Health Board, which runs the hospital, said: “We offer our apologies as this is not the standard of care we would wish to provide by keeping patients in the emergency department for this length of time.
“However, the hospital was under extreme pressure and there were delays in patients being transferred to appropriate wards in a timely way.”
In Wales’ Labour-run NHS, only 81 per cent of A&E patients spent less than four hours waiting last November.
Figures also reveal that just 90.2 per cent of patients in England were seen within four hours between October and December last year, short of the 95 per cent target.
It marks the worst performance in A&E since the target was set in 2004.
