Wales meets ambulance response targets

Official figures have shown that all seven health boards in Wales met their ambulance response times target in September.

The data showed that 79.5 per cent of emergency responses to red calls - the most severe - arrived within eight minutes - which is above the target of 65 per cent and up from 78.1 per cent in the previous month.

Figures showed that there were 37,549 emergency calls, an average of 1,252 per day, 0.5 per cent up on the daily average for August 2016.

Richard Lee, the Welsh Ambulance Service’s director of Operations, commented: “This month's performance for our RED - immediately life threatening calls is the best we have achieved since our new model launched last October.

“More importantly we have for the fourth month achieved this important target in every area of Wales.

“We are preparing for winter and looking at how we can provide a better response to patients with less serious injuries and illnesses.

“We will continue to work hard to improve the service we provide to patients across Wales, but I am really proud of the work of my staff both on ambulances and in the clinical contact centres day in day out responding to the needs of patients.”