"Waited over 5 hours for an ambulance"

[SUMMARY: it took an ambulance 5 1/2 hours to reach a casualty who was stuck on the side of the road in the middle on the night]

Whilst on holiday in Wales my friend dislocated her shoulder in the sea on a beach at about 7:30pm

. We rang emergency services and once they had assessed the severity of the injury through questions we were told an ambulance would be sent to the beach. 40 minutes later we were rung and told the injury wasn't a priority so a nurse was being sent instead but that the nearest a&e was over an hour away so it might be quicker to drive ourselves. 

My friend was in considerable pain but managed to get into our car so she could be driven to Bangor a&e. However 5 minutes down the road the movement of the car proved too painful and my friends were forced to stop in someone's driveway. The ambulance was rung to let them know where they were but they were again told the injury wasn't a priority so they would have to wait. 

The ambulance was rung several times over the next few hours by the people with the causality, a parent from home and myself. As we were a large group half of us had returned to our house when they set off for a&e and did not know what was happening or where our friends were. It was stressed that the casualty was stuck on the side of a road, in considerable pain and on the verge of being sick, which was a sign we had been warned about. However, I was rushed off the phone and not given any information as to when an ambulance might reach them. The people in the car with the casualty had a similar experience. When asked what call centre the person on the phone worked at, they were not given a definite answer. 

The injury occurred at roughly 7:30pm. An ambulance did not arrive until 1am. This was due partly to police who were passing the car stopping to help and calling for the ambulance to come quickly. In the time it took for help to reach them from a&e an hour away, a parent had driven the 3 hour journey from our home town in England. Upon arrival, a member of the crew was rude to my friends and commented that it would have been quicker if they had driven to a&e despite it being stressed countless times that they could not move without causing my friend considerable pain. 

Everyone involved found the whole experience extremely stressful, mostly down to the poor performance of the ambulance call centre and extremely slow response time of the ambulance itself. We are aware that they were dealing with other casualties that night but the response of the ambulance team was unacceptable and put our friends' safety at risk by leaving them on the side of a road for over 4 hours.