Labour MP Jess Phillips waited in hospital with her father for "around 17 hours" as he tried to get seen at A&E. The MP for Birmingham Yardley live tweeted the experience, which came as new figures showed a record number of people are enduring long waits in emergency rooms.
Ms Phillips first tweeted that she was in A&E with her dad at around 9pm on Wednesday. At around 2.30pm on Thursday, after updating her followers throughout the night, she confirmed they were home.
She wrote in her original tweet: “My dad is ill, my brother called 111 at 10am. They said he needed a paramedic and would send an ambulance. It never came.
"I got back from London in my car this evening, I drove because I simply cannot rely on trains anymore in the UK. We are now in A&E.”
Throughout the night and into Thursday morning, Ms Phillips posted a series of tweets documenting the experience. She interspersed them with criticisms of former health secretary Matt Hancock’s first appearance on ITV reality show I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!
“Still in A&E. Staff are lovely but so overwhelmed,” the Labour MP tweeted at 2.28am. She followed it up at 11.33am on Thursday by writing: “I should be in my constituency office right now alas I’m in a waiting room.”
At 11.40am she tweeted: "In cheerier tales from the hospital my dad and a 91 year old woman sat beside him for last 10 hours seem to be plotting an old people's revolution." And at 2.32pm she confirmed she and her father had left the hospital.
"Home now with bag loads of pills and instructions for monitoring," she wrote. "In total we spent around 17 hours in A&E.
"We were luckier than others. Special shout out to the amazing night staff who remained cheerful and kind throughout. Bloody heroes. #ClapsAreHollow"
Ms Phillips and her father are not alone in facing such ordeals, according to new data from NHS England. The latest data shows that the number of people waiting more than 12 hours from a decision to admit them to actually getting a bed rising to a new record high.
Some 43,792 people waited longer than 12 hours in October, up 34% from 32,776 in September and the highest number in records going back to August 2010.
