Virtually every day, ambulances are stacked up at Richmond-area hospitals with paramedics waiting to get the people they have transported admitted to the hospital so they can return to service.

The result: Longer response times for people who are not shot, suffering a heart attack or experiencing another life-threatening emergency that requires an immediate response.

The wait for an ambulance is what happened to J. Maurice Hopkins. As the Free Press reported in the Jan. 4-6 edition, he waited an hour and 18 minutes for a Richmond ambulance after suffering a fall on a Church Hill sidewalk that destroyed his knees and left him needing to be placed on a stretcher to be moved.

At 8 p.m. Dec. 26 when his family called 911, three of the 10 ambulances that were on duty at the time were tied up on hospital runs, according to emergency dispatch logs.

In response to a Free Press query, Bon Secours spokeswoman Jenna Green stated increases in respiratory illnesses such as COVID-19 and the flu, has led to “an increase in patients seeking medical attention.”

St. Mary’s, the largest medical center in Bon Secours Richmond operations, has been “facing a higher than usual number of respiratory illnesses. During periods when our emergency department or our hospital is nearing full occupancy, it is possible for wait times to be longer for patients with less severe conditions,” Ms. Green stated, though she noted there is an “ebb and flow to wait times.

“Our teams are working to provide prompt and efficient care to all of our patients,” she continued, “and we strive to accommodate their needs as quickly as possible.”

Other hospitals, including VCU Health, did not offer statements.

The situation of hospitals is harder to determine given that databases that the state and Virginia Health Information previously supported to track hospital admissions, ventilator usage and intensive care unit bed availability are no longer being maintained.

The only view of the situation comes from data that the Richmond Ambulance Authority complies and reports weekly on its Facebook page.

That data shows that on average, 20% of transports wait 30 minutes or longer to move a patient to a hospital bed. A wait of an hour or more is not uncommon, according to the RAA.

For example, during the first week of January, RAA reported its ambulances responded to 853 emergency calls, transported 613 people and waited 30 minutes or longer on 143 of those calls or 23%.

Amir Patel, RAA deputy chief of operations, said the turnaround time for ambulances to deliver patients to a hospital and be back in service “has grown worse” in the 16 years he has been employed by the authority.

Prior to the arrival of COVID-19 in March 2020, ambulance runs were relatively quick, according to Chip Decker, RAA’s chief executive officer. He said it was expected that ambulances could transport patients and be ready for the next call in 30 minutes or less.

As hospitals became clogged with COVID patients after the pandemic began, waits up to two hours became all too common and are on the rise again.