A woman with a seriously injured foot was left waiting in agony for over two hours for an ambulance on a freezing cold dark night before eventually being taken to hospital in a police car.

The drama unfolded in Pembroke on Saturday night when the woman, believed to be in her 60s, fell and hurt herself.

Members of the public who went to her aid immediately called 999 and requested ambulance assistance.

However, despite the intervention of police, who wrapped her in a thermal blanket and tried to make her as comfortable as possible whilst she was lying on the ground, she was still awaiting medical assistance some two hours later.

"There were no ambulances available on Saturday night at all," said a member of the public who contacted us about the incident.

"It was a horrendous incident," continued the person who asked not to be named.

"The casualty's foot became very swollen and the person also suffered a hypothermic shock.

"The situation is getting ridiculous with ambulances in Pembrokeshire. The police did their best, but why should we allow this to go on in our county? The police are not trained medics and lives are being put at risk because of the situation. Unless we cause a fuss about what's happening with our ambulance service, it will just get worse.

"The police resources should have been deployed elsewhere and, in fact, they did have to leave the woman to attend another incident in the town."

Rob Jeffery, the Welsh Ambulance Service's head of operations for the Hywel Dda and Powys area, said: "At approximately 10.40 pm on Saturday, we were called to help a woman who had injured her foot on The Parade in Pembroke. Although this call was important to us, it was assessed and categorised as non-life threatening. We were eventually able to allocate a vehicle on what was a busy Saturday night, but this was cancelled prior to our arrival by police, who said that they would convey the woman to hospital."

When we contacted the police, a spokeswoman for Dyfed Powys Police said: "At approximately 10.25 pm on Saturday, February 28, police received a report of concern for an injured woman found outside a property in Main Street, Pembroke. She had been outside for some time and had what appeared to be a serious injury to her foot. Police conveyed the woman to Withybush hospital for treatment."

The resident who contacted us about the incident has also lobbied Simon Hart MP and Angela Burns AM.

Simon Hart told us: "The lack of ambulances is something which I have been highlighting for a number of years and it is starting to reach crisis point. I hear that crews are left stranded outside hospitals for hours on end waiting to hand over patients, which is simply not acceptable. Nor is it appropriate that the police are having to do the job of medics and are increasingly transferring patients themselves to hospital. The police and Crime Commissioner says that police officers are having to take about 12 patients a month to hospital."

Although Angela Burns was unavailable for comment at the moment, she has already written to the Chief Constable, Simon Price, for more information about their thoughts on the events of the night. She would like to have that information before writing to the Welsh Ambulance Services Trust.