Coventry Uni Hospital criticised over elderly man's care

[dutchman]

An inquiry has criticised the care given to an elderly Coventry man who died hours after being sent home from hospital.



The 89-year old was discharged from University Hospital in 2007 – even though he was still suffering from severe diarrhoea caused by the superbug C-difficile.

Coventry’s Safeguarding Adults Board ruled he shouldn’t have been released given the severity of his condition, although C-difficile wasn’t responsible for his death.

They made 13 recommendations for the hospital, Coventry City Council and West Midlands Ambulance Service to change certain working practices.

Brian Walsh, who chairs the Board, said: ”There is no evidence that any actions of the organisations involved directly caused his death but it is clear that there are lessons that could and have been learned in the future to reduce the likelihood of these circumstances recurring.”

“Three of the recommendations also look to ensure that the Review process is faster in the future as three-and-a-half years have been too long for this Review to be concluded.”

“However, the Safeguarding Adults’ Board is satisfied that all organisations involved in the Serious Case Review have co-operated in an open and transparent manner.”

Jill Foster, Acting Chief Nursing Officer at University Hospital, added: “Although we are assured that we could not have changed the outcome for this gentleman, if he had not been discharged then his last few hours would have been more peaceful and comfortable and for this we would like to apologise to his family.”

“This case also highlighted where areas of discharge and communication between ourselves and other care facilities could be improved.”

“Although we know there is still work to do, since 2007 we have introduced a series of measures to try and improve the discharge process including reviewing and re-writing our discharge policy and amending our discharge summary information to ensure it includes prompts to staff to ensure when a patient leaves hospital, they do so safely.”