The coroner Mary-Anne Borrowdale criticised St John for sending an available ambulance to a less urgent incident instead of directly responding to Margaret Wells’ heart attack call.
The incident took place in the early hours of 20 September 2020.
Despite her husband’s desperate calls, the ambulance took over an hour to arrive.
The coroner stressed the need for an immediate response and suggested improvements in assessing caller constraints.
While St John’s delayed response contributed to the outcome, it didn’t cause Wells’ death, which was attributed to natural causes.
According to a report in state media, at around 2:45 am, Margaret Wells woke her husband Alfred, asking him to call an ambulance as she was experiencing symptoms including vomiting, pallor, sweating, and chest pains.
Alfred dialed 111 five minutes later, reporting his wife’s condition as a heart attack. The call handler assured help was being organised and advised to call again if her condition worsened.
By 3:40 am, with no ambulance arrival, Alfred called 111 again, stating his wife wasn’t breathing. The call handler guided him through CPR instructions, despite Alfred being a double amputee and unable to lift her easily.
When the ambulance finally arrived at 3:46 am, Margaret was found unconscious and not breathing, with Alfred performing CPR ineffectively. Despite efforts by the crew, she was pronounced dead at 4:20 am.
Oh yes,waste money on the Kiev regime and sucking up to the corrupt US establishment but forget about the health ace well being of of everyday Kiwis. St Johns are a great service and should see a handsome investment of public funds….but of course first, we need decent govt….instead we have whatever this latest dismal coalition is….
The Coroner, who is now legally allowed to write “cause of death unknown”, might want to lower her voice on the topic of sudden heart attacks 💉
Sorry for this poor woman that help never arrived in time. The take away is it’s better to load a loved one into your car and get them to the hospital yourself.