A SURVEY carried out by the East Anglian Ambulance Trust has revealed that 59 per cent of people estimated that they waited longer than they actually had for an emergency ambulance.

A SURVEY carried out by the East Anglian Ambulance Trust has revealed that 59 per cent of people estimated that they waited longer than they actually had for an emergency ambulance.

The first study of its kind is part of a patient satisfaction survey of 3,000 people who had used the 999 emergency ambulance service.

In the survey, which was carried out over a 12 week period between November 2000 and February 2001, only 17pc estimated correctly the amount of time they had waited for an emergency service.

This highlighted that people's perception of time while waiting for an emergency service is distorted by their natural state of anxiety.

Despite this, 96pc of all users questioned said they were satisfied with the time they had to wait for an emergency ambulance.

The average wait in the survey was nine minutes. Just 2pc said their response time was "barely acceptable" or "not acceptable".

Overall the users rated satisfaction with the service very high at 98pc.

Despite the very high levels of satisfaction noted, the survey also highlighted areas for improvement. Most of these comments were suggestions of how to improve response times, especially in the rural areas, and also ways in which ambulance staff could communicate better on occasions with the users of the service in an emergency,

Dr John Scott, clinical director of the Trust, said he was delighted with the results from the first ever survey of its kind.

"The East Anglian Ambulance Service is always striving to improve its service to the public and asking the patients is a very good way of learning what they want from the service.

"It is now intended to continue the survey on a regular basis and to feedback these results to all our staff."