A HOSPITAL has made ‘significant improvements’ to its system after a beloved Rochford mother had to wait seven hours for an ambulance when she died last year.

Maria Devlin of Ashindgdon Heights, Rochford died from stomach and heart issues in the early hours of March 2022.

Mrs Devlin’s family first called the ambulance at around 5.33pm on March 29 as she was having problems with her breathing.

Several calls were made to the ambulance service as the Devlin family performed CPR as instructed by paramedics.

The ambulance arrived at 12.30am and Mrs Devlin was sadly pronounced dead at 1.57 at her home

An inquest into her death resumed in Chelmsford on December 13 following an adjournment in October.

Zoe Gregori, director of operations at Southend Hospital, said: “The emergency department at Southend Hospital was designed for 66 patients, on March 29, 2022, our report said there were 122 patients at the emergency department.

“The resuscitation department was also full and out of 162 patients, 62 were majored and needed 62 majored cubicles but only had 16 available.

“We were expecting 300 attendances for that day and at 10pm we had 286, by the end of the day we had 328 which is a lot higher capacity, 15 per cent more than expected.”

The court heard six calls were made to paramedics before an ambulance started making their journey to Mrs Devlin at 12.30am.

However the air aimbulance was not functioning at that time so a Health and Emergency Services (HEMS) doctor travelled by road, arriving at 1.20am because of road closures and traffic.

Concerns were raised regarding whether Mrs Devlin would have received treatment at Southend Hospital even if she arrived.

Ms Gregori added: “We have made significant improvements in ambulance offload and handover time since March 2022.

“Since March 22 we have introduced a new leadership structure and team with a new managing director.

“The average handover time in December 2022 was 96 minutes, in November the average handover time was cut to 28 minutes.

“We have also taken on an average of 600 additional ambulances a month.”

The inquest will continue in January.