Latest news with #RoyalShrewsburyHospital
Telegraph
18-05-2025
- Health
- Telegraph
I was branded pushy by hospital that killed my father
A woman was branded 'pushy' by an NHS hospital that's failings led to her father's death. Trevor Collins died aged 83 in 2022 from basic failures in care, days after telling his daughter, Sarah Bentley, that staff at Royal Shrewsbury hospital were 'going to kill me'. Mrs Bentley felt her concerns were ignored by hospital staff and later found they wrote on her father's medical notes: 'Family is pushy!' Mr Collins subsequently died from aspiration pneumonia on May 14 2022, after contents from his stomach entered his lungs. This week a coroner ruled the hospital was responsible for 'gross failings and neglect', which contributed to his avoidable death. Mrs Bentley told The Telegraph: 'We were really appalled by what we saw, but all our concerns fell on deaf ears.' When she requested her father's medical notes after his death, Mrs Bentley discovered staff's handwritten and underlined notes about her family. 'I don't think we were pushy enough, I wish I'd chained myself to the bed,' she said. 'Dad phoned me up at 5 o'clock one morning, saying: 'Sarah, you have to get me out of here, they are going to kill me'.' Mrs Bentley has spent the years since unable to grieve and fighting for the hospital to be held accountable after it initially failed to mark his death as a 'serious incident', meaning there was no investigation. 'I'm not a lawyer, I'm not a doctor, I'm a daughter,' she said. 'I've barely been able to grieve. Instead I've had to fight to find out what went wrong in that place.' An inquest, which concluded this week, ruled that Mr Collins's death was preventable and that the care he received at the Royal Shrewsbury hospital was 'more than suboptimal'. In his verdict, Heath Westerman, the coroner, found that systemic 'gross failings' and 'neglect' had contributed to the death. The post mortem examination found several feet of faecal matter obstructing his small bowel. Despite having a severely bloated stomach and not passing a normal bowel movement for eight weeks, doctors never considered treating Mr Collins's constipation, according to an internal report. Mr Westerman said staff had 'no plan' on how to deal with Mr Collins's constipation, showed poor use of documentation, and that moving him from ward to ward resulted in a lack of medical ownership. A key issue in Mr Collins's care was the failure to insert a nasogastric tube to drain his stomach contents – a simple intervention that could have saved his life. Mrs Bentley said: 'It was really hard for us to hear that something so simple was missed. The most basic care was lacking.' Dr John Jones, medical director at the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust, said there had been several 'key omissions of care', and it was 'not clear' why another tube had not been put in. 'Catastrophic failures' The Royal Shrewsbury hospital has been the subject of numerous controversies in recent years. Last summer, an undercover Channel 4 documentary found patients sitting for 24 hours in waiting rooms and makeshift corridor wards. In 2022, a report revealed that more than 200 babies and nine mothers may have died because of catastrophic failures at the hospital and its sister site, the Princess Royal in Telford. Helen Morgan, MP for North Shropshire, helped Mrs Bentley secure a review and inquest after months of delays. She said it was 'concerning' she had to intervene in Mr Collins's case before any action was taken, given the historic issues the hospital has had. 'We will support management to make changes, but we will continue to hold them to account,' she said. Dr Steve McKew, the trust's deputy medical director, said: 'We offer our sincere apologies for the failings Mr Collins experienced while under our care, and for the subsequent experience of his family who rightly approached the trust with their concerns. 'We are taking rapid action to address the findings of the coroner, and have already introduced a more robust electronic recording system to monitor and record patients' bowel functions.' 'Adding any inappropriate comments to patients' notes is completely unacceptable, and we have enhanced our internal training programme to reinforce the importance of professional and sympathetic conduct.' The coroner did not order a prevention of future deaths report, claiming the trust had already made significant improvements in recent years, 'albeit that process took too long'. Addressing Mrs Bentley at the inquest, Mr Westerman said: 'I salute your bravery. I think you should be proud of what you have done on behalf of your dad.' Now Mrs Bentley wants to encourage others to advocate for their family members in hospital. 'Speak up, speak up, I can't urge people enough,' she said. 'It is your right to ask questions, to be told what's happening with your family, or when something goes wrong.'
BBC News
16-05-2025
- Health
- BBC News
Calls for £95m maternity safety funding to remain ringfenced
There are growing calls for millions of pounds of maternity care funding, announced after the Shropshire baby deaths scandal, to remain - including the Reverend Charlotte Cheshire, whose son was left severely disabled - have written to the health secretary about how individual health boards in England could now decide where to spend their money.A maternity care review in 2022 found more than 200 babies and nine mothers treated by NHS Shropshire Telford and Wrekin could have survived with better care. A Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) accepted too many women were still not getting the care they deserved, but the government was "determined" to change that. A spokesperson said the same level of funding was still being provided, but as part of broader allocations, to give more flexibility to local healthcare review following the scandal in Shropshire also found a further 94 children, like Rev Cheshire's son, Adam, suffered life changing was left severely disabled following an infection he developed after his birth at the Royal Shrewsbury interim report in 2021 led to maternity care spending nationally being increased by £95m with the aim of improving safety - but it has since emerged this cash will no longer be ringfenced. "For me that's both tragic and catastrophic," Rev Cheshire 47-year-old vicar from Newport, Shropshire, said the money had been specifically ringfenced because it was one of the worst maternity scandals in NHS Adam now being 14, he still plays with toys meant for toddlers and lives in residential care with 24-hour has a brain injury, is autistic, has hearing and sight impairments as well as profound learning providing better maternity care, the DHSC spokesperson said: "This starts with listening to women and families to learn lessons, to improve care and ensure mistakes are not repeated."They said they were training more midwives to support women throughout their pregnancy and after giving birth. Care minister Stephen Kinnock said local Integrated Care Boards (ICB) were best placed to decide how best to manage care in their said his department was not micro-managing ICBs, but they would be held accountable through targets being ICB receives nearly £900,000 of the £95m allocated at NHS Shropshire Telford and Wrekin said they were committed to making improvements to maternity services."As an Integrated Care Board, we have not made any changes to the level of service development funding allocated to our local maternity care in 2025/26," a spokesperson said. Ten-year plan Rev Cheshire told the BBC she remained worried, and her experiences meant she had lost trust in the Birth Trauma Association said it had concerns chief executive Kim Thomas, said: "We know that Wes Streeting cares about maternity because he says it keeps him awake at night."She said she was hoping details contained in a forthcoming 10-year plan, due to be published in June, may provide more DHSC spokesperson said progress had been made on a number of the recommendations from the All Party Parliamentary Group on Birth Trauma – including achieving a 5.8% increase in the number of announced this week a rollout of a national training programme to reduce the number of brain injuries incurred during childbirth, but acknowledged more needed to be done. Follow BBC Shropshire on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
BBC News
09-05-2025
- Health
- BBC News
Shrewsbury park-and-ride hospital buses to be made permanent
A hospital park-and-ride service will be made permanent in Shropshire after a successful and Telford Hospital NHS Trust started offering bus journeys to Royal Shrewsbury Hospital in January, using an existing staff said the route would remain free until it became permanent from 19 May, at which point users would be charged £1 per return journey. People with a disabled person's bus pass and children under the age of 16 will be free, if accompanied by an adult. Interim chief nursing officer Paula Gardner said the trust had been "really pleased with the feedback" from people during the and visitors will be able to use the buses at any time from 06:20 until 21:25, and they will run between the Oxon park-and-ride car park and the hospital's main services will leave every 15 to 20 the hospital advised passengers buses would be busy before 10:00 and after 15:00, because staff would be using is currently no service on Saturdays, Sundays and bank holidays. Follow BBC Shropshire on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
