Hospital fails scores of patients
03/01/12: More than 20 families have approached solicitors regarding horrific claims of basic failures of care and indignities at a Redditch hospital.
Solicitors think that the claims could represent a very small proportion of the real number of claims and are planning to launch a class action, the biggest of its kind since a public inquiry was launched to investigate failings within the NHS and its’ regulators’ in regard to patient care.
The cases include
• A man in his mid-thirties who died because staff didn’t know how to connect a feeding tube.
• A retired person who was left without crucial medication or food.
• A man who lost consciousness after he contracted Ecoli, seemingly from a dirty catheter.
• Allegations that meal trays were put out of the reach of patients, and others being left in wet bed linen.
Statistics show death rates of the trust, which operates the hospital, were about 10% higher than the country’s overall average in 2010/11, this equates to 239 deaths more than should be expected.
The legal action comes at the same time as increasing concern about general overall standards of hospital care failures in protecting vulnerable patients.
An earlier report has already condemned the NHS for its unacceptable treatment of elderly patients.
Findings revealed that hospitals were failing to meet patients’ basic needs, with many being left hungry, dirty or given incorrect medication because of staff members’ casual indifference.
Leigh Day solicitors, who previously won the biggest group claim against Alexandra hospital in Stafford said that they believed that the families who had already contacted them could represent a very small proportion of the real number of claims.
The action will follow the CQC spot check findings after they visited 100 hospitals to look at the care of elderly patients.
50% of hospitals were discovered to be failing in basic care standards and serious concerns were found at 2, including the Alexandra where failings were so basic that it was considered that they were breaking the law.
So many patients were found to be at risk of dehydration that doctors had to prescribe water.
Since that time nearly two dozen horrified families have contacted solicitors about their cases. Some have been seeking an explanation for almost ten years but in other cases the neglect occurred as recently as July.
A spokesperson for the legal firm, Leigh Day commented that many families had given up any hope of justice prior to the publication of the CQC report into the hospital. Solicitors will argue that the treatment received by many of the patients was so compromised and degrading that it constitutes a breach of human rights.
The firm has already been instructed to proceed by 17 families, and is still considering a further 6 potential cases.
Bells weren’t answered and patients were left to lie in soaking bed linen or sitting in their own faeces for hours on end.
The Director of Nursing at the trust has said that the hospital actively seeks feedback from patients and their families and if there is an indication that standards are falling short, we always address it.
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