A son has spoken of how his mum died after she waited five hours for an ambulance to take her to hospital.

Kim Hawkins, from Stanford-le-Hope, was devastated after his mum died in hospital, but he was also angry that she had had to wait five hours for an ambulance to pick her up.

Jeanette Hawkins, 81, fell to the floor one day in agony after she began to suffer severe abdominal pains.

When her 82-year-old husband, John Hawkins, arrived home, he called a doctor.

When the doctor arrived, around 2pm, he alerted the ambulance services to take Jeanette to the hospital but it was initially not treated as an emergency.

However, after waiting an hour for the ambulance to arrive, concerned for his wife’s health, John called the ambulance back to see how long they were going to be. They asked him if Jeanette was conscious and breathing. As she was, her situation was still not treated as an emergency.

Later, around 6pm, Kim came over with his wife, Joanne Hawkins, and Janette’s state had worsened.

Joanne immediately called the ambulance and told them that it was an emergency.

Although Joanne stated the urgency, the ambulance arrived more than an hour later at 7:15pm. Kim continued: “When the ambulance workers got there they asked ‘how long has this woman been like this?’ They could tell it was serious.”

Jeanette was immediately rushed from her home in Stanford-le-Hope to Basildon Hospital where she was operated on.

But, unfortunately, she died the following morning on August 24 this year.

A post-mortem result came back saying that she had died from Faecal Peritonitis which was a result of her having a perforated diverticulitis - meaning that her excrement had seeped into her blood stream and poisoned her.

Kim has made a formal complaint to the Patient and Liaison Services (PALS) and is awaiting a response from them.

A spokesman for the East of England Ambulance Services said: “Our sincere condolences go to the Hawkins family for their loss. Their concerns are being fully investigated by the trust and we will be reporting those findings back to the family in due course.”