North East Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust

3. Mrs P complains about the care and treatment the Trust provided to her husband, Mr P, in October 2023. Specifically, she complains the Trust delayed sending an ambulance when her husband was very unwell and deteriorating.

4. Mr P developed sepsis and Mrs P says he never fully recovered from this. Mrs P explains this led to his death in January 2026. She says her husband was left to suffer and this was devastating and could have been avoided.

5. Mrs P would like the Trust to apologise, acknowledge where it got things wrong and make service improvements so this does not happen to anyone else.

8. The law says a person needs to make their complaint to us within a year of becoming aware of the problem. We cannot usually investigate complaints brought to us after one year, unless we consider there is a good reason to do so. We have discussed this with Mrs P to understand the reasons why she could not come to us sooner. We have also considered the time the organisation took to respond to her.

9. Mrs P complains to us about the care and treatment her husband received when his ambulance was delayed in October 2023 and he developed sepsis. Mrs P explains this was the date of events, and her date of knowledge. Date of knowledge is the term we use for when someone knew they had a reason to complain.

10. For the complaint to come to us in time, it would need to reach us by October 2024. Mrs P complained to the Trust in good time, in October 2023. The Trust provided its first complaint response in January 2024 and advised her to contact us promptly due to our time limit.

11. Mrs P returned to the Trust in February 2024, and it responded again later that month. It advised her if she was still unhappy to escalate her concerns to us without delay because of our time limit. Based on this, we consider local resolution was complete in February 2024. The complaint came to us in March 2026, almost two and a half years after events, and a year and a half outside of our time limit.

12. We have carefully considered this with Mrs P to understand any reasons why the complaint could not come to us sooner or any barriers she experienced. Mrs P explained she did not have time as she was caring for her husband and then also experienced her own injury when she broke her ankle. We recognise this was a very difficult period for her. At the same time, Mrs P had been able to engage with the Trust to pursue her complaint locally during this period, which suggests it may have been possible for the complaint to come to us sooner.

13. Mrs P has acknowledged she was aware of our time limit, but she told us it was only after her husband’s death in January 2026 that she felt she wanted to take things further. We empathise with the position she was in and are sorry to have learned about what she has been through.

14. We must apply our policy and legislation fairly and in line with the law. Our policy explains that someone may be aware of an issue at the time, but not experience a more serious impact until a later date. In this situation, the date of the initial care and treatment is still the date when the person has ground to complain, rather than the date when the impact felt more serious.

15. Based on the above regrettably we have not been able to set our time limit to one side and consider the case further. We are grateful for Mrs P taking the time to contact us and share with us what happened. Our decision is not a reflection of the importance of her concerns or what she has experienced.

1. We have considered Mrs P’s complaint about the care her husband received from the Trust. We would like to extend our condolences for the sad loss of her husband and recognise what a difficult time she has been through.

2. After careful consideration, we think the complaint falls outside our time limit so we have decided not to consider it further. Our decision does not lessen the significance of the events or what Mrs P has told us, and we will explain our reasons in full below.