REGARDING the story: Fury at 90-min ambulance wait, I would like to add my comments to the 999 call.

My wife had a bad fall sustaining a very bad head wound with blood gushing out and lying on the concrete path and  with her left arm limp.

I covered the wound and went to call the 999 service.

After a very long time convincing the operator of where we lived he said they were very busy and an ambulance would be here as soon as possible.

A first response man came within a short time and soon after a paramedic who, I must say, were very good.

The ambulance turned up after two hours and when the medic came down our path she just stopped and started to admire the garden, I won’t say what I said.

She looked down at my wife and shouted to the driver to get the stretcher.

If it were not for the two men and myself they would have had a problem getting her on the stretcher.

The worst was to come, the driver asked me the best way to Gloucester hospital which was to go past Parkend village and on to Blakeney.

The driver ignored my directions and turned at Parkend and carried on to Lydney but on the outskirts he turned left up Spring Meadow Road then right into Albert Street then left up Highfield road.

The driver never used the blue lights and stopped at two road works red lights and then followed a tractor for around a mile.

On reaching the hospital I asked him why he  didn’t go the way I suggested, he said the road was too rough. I can’t write what I told him.

My wife had two fractures in her left arm and on having a scan she had sustained a fractured skull and fractured vertebrae in her neck, it was touch and go whether she would have to be transferred to Southmead spinal unit for fear of her being paralysed but luckily she had a collar to keep her head from turning.

It took almost two hours to put the forty plus stitches in her head wound.

It took almost three hours from the 999 call to arrival at Gloucester Royal Hospital.

I thought a 999 call would be for an emergency not a Sunday drive to the hospital – to say I am furious is an understatement.

– Bernard Pendrey, Ellwood.