FRAIL and vulnerable people travelling to and from South Yorkshire hospitals via the patient transport service are having to put up with long and unacceptable delays.
A survey has found the service – used mainly by people who are too ill to drive or take public transport and have no relatives who can help them – needs "significant improvements".
The worst hold-ups were in Rotherham, where 97 per cent of patient
s ended up an hour late. Similar delays were experienced by 95 per cent of users in Barnsley and 90 per cent in Doncaster.
In Sheffield, just under half of patients also experienced hold-ups.
Some 47 per cent of people being ferried to sites run by Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust – the Royal Hallamshire, Northern General, Jessop Wing, Weston Park and Charles Clifford hospitals – arrived 60 minutes late.
And 42 per cent of young patients using the transport service arrived an hour late for appointments at Sheffield Children's Hospital.
The patient transport service is run by Yorkshire Ambulance Service and is relied upon by up to 1.6 million people. But the survey, commissioned by service bosses and which took place in March, found only two in five journeys were on time.
Sarah Fatchett, interim operations director for the service, said: "We have reported to our board that there are significant improvements to be made.
"The focus of our work for the remainder of the year is to improve journey times."
She said that new ways of working have been trialled elsewhere in the county and these will be rolled out in the coming months to try to reduce delays.
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