A 73-year old dementia patient soiled herself four times while waiting on a trolley in a hospital corridor for eight hours after suffering a nasty fall at her care home in Liverpool.
The vulnerable pensioner had already waited an hour for an ambulance to arrive before the traumatic experience, which didn't end there.
She waited over 30 minutes in wet sheets before being cleaned up and moved back to the corridor - where it then took eight hours before she was finally seen by a doctor.
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The patient's family documented the horrific ordeal in a message to Labour councillor Paul Kenyon last week, who read it out loud at a social care and health select committee meeting on Tuesday.
The message to Cllr Kenyon said: "We waited from 6.30pm to 2.30am. After a long wait in the corridor a doctor finally took us to a spare room and inserted stitches into mum's head.
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"We were sent home with a children’s head injury information leaflet and had to wait again for an ambulance to take us home.
“My mum was so confused and agitated and very vulnerable during this time. It was chaotic. She deserved better than this."
Cllr Kenyon, who is a full-time nurse, said the patient's distress highlighted the impact the work force shortages across the NHS are having on vulnerable individuals across the city.
The meeting saw representatives from Liverpool's Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) present key points on the NHS Long Term Plan.
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The Long Term Plan is a recently published document that sets out priorities for spending some £20.5bn worth of funding promised by the Government for the NHS last year.
Priorities include improving out of hospital care, reducing pressure on A&E, and focusing on prevention and reducing health inequalities.
But health care expert Cllr Kenyon questioned how any of this could be achieved if the recruitment crisis straining the NHS was not addressed.
Delivering an impassioned speech he said: "One of the biggest issues that is actually affecting the NHS is out of the control of the CCG, it's actually the work force challenge.
"Probably one of the most damaging impacts the government's austerity agenda has had on NHS staffing is the biggest fall in nursing applicants in the history of nursing.
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"Since the government chose to scrap the nursing bursaries, at the same time as cutting corporation tax for the riches companies, applications to study nursing have fallen by a third. That's added to a drop in 10% of people who are accepted onto the course.
"The government has got its fingers in its ears and is continuing to plough ahead with disastrous policies.
"The plan fails to address the cuts to staff we have seen over the last 10 years. We need to address the work force crisis otherwise the long term plan is just a wish list."
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There are around 100,000 staff shortages across the whole of the NHS, which Cllr Kenyon said will increase to 250,000 over the next 10 years if no action is taken to recruit and retain more staff.
Locally, staff shortages are not only putting pressure on our hospitals but have also resulted in a number of GP practices closing across the city, affecting thousands of patients in some of the poorest areas of the city.
At a previous social care and health select committee, members of the CCG admitted a national recruitment crisis was making it more difficult to retain medical staff at small GP practices in more "challenging" areas of the city, and said there was nothing to stop them choosing to work in "those practices that are probably in the leafy suburbs".
On Tuesday night's meeting, chief officer of Liverpool CCG Jan Ledward said there was a difficult challenge ahead but that plans are in place to drive recruitment locally.
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She said: "Obviously it's key that we work with the education establishments locally because if people train here we want them to stay here.
"But it's not just about recruiting new people, it's about retaining the ones we have got. There's a lot of work going on looking at how we support staff and make our environments good places to work.
"There's been an increase in violence towards NHS staff and that will not be tolerated. We have got to support people more effectively. It's incredibly difficult.
"There is some work going on nationally looking at what needs to be done to do more. It's a bit late, but we will value any focus there is coming in on increasing the work force. There's a whole range of things being considered. We have got to think out the box where we can."
