A HEALTH board has denied TV presenter Richard Madeley received “preferential treatment” after being hospitalised while appearing on a popular ITV show.

The 65-year-old was taken to hospital as a medical precaution after falling ill at the I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! camp at Gwyrch Castle, Abergele in the early hours last Thursday morning.

There had been speculation that the Good Morning Britain host, who has since said he believes he suffered from dehydration, was given faster access to medical treatment as Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board (BCUHB).

The health board is working to reduce A&E waiting times, which were found to be “the worst on record” in August after missing its target of 95 per cent of patients spending less than four hours in an emergency department.

But the health board said the “tacit suggestion” that Mr Madeley had been fast-tracked through its A&E department are false, adding that it prioritises the needs of patients “irrespective of their celebrity status”.

A BCUHB spokesperson said: “In today’s media coverage of Richard Madeley’s recent hospitalisation, there has been a tacit suggestion that he was given preferential treatment.

“We are unable to comment on the prioritisation or treatment of any individual patients.

“However, we wish to remind people that in line with the founding principles of the NHS, we always prioritise patients on the basis of clinical need, irrespective of their celebrity status.”

BCUHB lost 6,000 handover hours because of Welsh Ambulance Service delays, almost double the nearest health board, while just under 48 per cent of urgent emergency calls had been responded to in the eight-minute time frame, almost 20 per cent below the ambulance service target.

Mr Madeley was blocked from returning to the show due to Covid regulations.

Speaking on Good Morning Britain on Monday morning, he said: “I think what happened to me was I got dehydrated. I think that’s all it was.

“But dehydration, if anyone’s ever suffered from it, is actually quite disturbing. Basically I think I had been up for about 20 hours the day before.

“And the day before that we were having very long days and sleeping quite late, and we don’t have watches in there, but I don’t think I got to bed until about 4, 4.30 in the morning and I knew I was feeling thirsty and I’m quite bad at remembering to drink actually.

“And as I actually snuggled into my sleeping bag, it was freezing, I thought: ‘Ah, I haven’t had a big drink in a while, I’ll do it when I wake up’.

“The next thing I knew I was sitting there babbling, I was talking nonsense… I basically woke up I didn’t know where I was, what was going on and I could hardly string a sentence together.

“As it turned out, it was harmless, there was nothing wrong.

“I went to the hospital, had all the tests you can imagine, got a 100 per cent clean bill of health and they were happy for me to go back in.”

He added that ITV producers had been “wracking our brains” but he could not be allowed bac on the show due to leaving its Covid-19 bubble.