A NORTH Wales councillor who collapsed in agony with back pain spent two days in A&E before he was finally admitted to a ward. Tremeirchion councillor Chris Evans was at home in Rhuallt, Denbighshire, collapsed at home last month with debilitating back pain. Cllr Evans who has compressed discs was unable to move from the kitchen floor so his wife Susan called for an ambulance.
After a six-hour wait he was taken to Ysbyty Glan Clwyd, Bodelwyddan, where he says he waited three to four hours, on Saturday, September 27, before he was finally admitted into the hospital’s emergency department which was only the end of the beginning of his marathon wait. He has spoken out about his ordeal in a bid to raise awareness of the “dire state” of the health service in North Wales. He said he’d been “ill for six-odd months with pain down the bottom of my back” and had been taking painkillers and was seeing a chiropractor, prior to his collapse in front of his children, Sam, eight, and Evie, 10.
After the ambulance was called he “rang a neighbour to help pick me up off the floor, but I couldn’t move”. He added: “It was shooting pain, and once I was on the floor, I couldn’t pick myself up. My bottom half was welded to the floor.
I was paralysed. It was the worst pain I’ve ever had. It was like somebody putting a hot poker into my leg and back – it was 11 out of 10 pain”.
Tremeirchion councillor Chris Evans was at home in Rhuallt on September 27 when he collapsed aft.