A PENSIONER suffered severe injuries when she fell in her flat was saved from hours of agony by a quick-thinking minicab driver.

The elderly woman Mary O'Rourke, of Ben Curtis Park, West Wickham, fell in the sitting room of her warden-controlled bungalow but had decided not to wear her panic button necklace so she could not call for help.

She suffered a broken left hip, fractured left shoulder and several cracked ribs and feared she would have to lie in agony all night before her warden came to check.

But the minicab she had booked to take her to a routine doctor's appointment arrived at about 4.15pm and driver Michael Maslin took action when he knocked on the door and received no reply.

Mr Maslin, 50, of Hayesford Park, Bromley, said he had a feeling something was wrong.

He said: "I looked through a crack and I could just see the outline of her feet through a door.

"I climbed around the back and tapped on the window and she looked up so I knew she was conscious."

He tried to break in but couldn't so he alerted a neighbour and the manager of his cab company Cannon Cars in Hayes.

The warden was called and Mrs O'Rourke was rushed by ambulance to Bromley Hospital where she was treated for her injuries and is now recovering at home.

Mrs O'Rourke's daughter, Diane Turpin, 61, of Woodmere Way, Beckenham, said: "She would have been there all night if the driver had not come to pick her up. The firm concerned was very compassionate. It was exemplary in its action."

She said Glebe Housing Association, which oversees Mrs O'Rouke's bungalow, was "beyond reproach" for the incident on February 4.

Robert Fevyer, director of the association said: "I'm just pleased she was all right. That was all I was worried about really." He added they always stress it is "absolutely vital" clients wear their panic buttons at all times.