A GOOD Samaritan has criticised paramedics after an elderly man had to wait nearly an hour for an ambulance.

Carl Wood, 35, was leaving his friend’s house in Clarendon Road, Canvey, when he found a man in his eighties collapsed on the floor.

The man, who has Parkinson’s disease, was left with a head injury and cuts to his face.

Mr Wood, who lives on the island, dialled 999 just before 2pm on Monday, but was shocked when an ambulance had still not turned up 45 minutes later. Mr Wood said: “Because he had Parkinson’s disease, he didn’t really knowwhatwas going on, but his wife was really panicking.”

“It was really scary, I was just glad I was there to help. I called back to find out what was happening and made it clear the man had knocked his head, but it didn’t seem to hurry the ambulance up. I couldn't believe it.”

East of England Ambulance Service graded the call green as it was not deemed urgent or life threatening. An ambulance should have arrived within 30 minutes, but instead turned up 47 minutes after the initial call.

Dr Anthony Marsh said: “We were called at 1.58pm to a man in his 80s who had fallen over and an ambulance arrived at 2.46pm.

Although we got to him in under an hour we would have hoped to have been there more quickly and we want to apologise to the gentleman. We want to thank the lady that stayed with him and followed the advice given by our call handler.”