Get tough call over harrowing cases of patient neglect

The campaign group has published a set of harrowing case studies of patients, many of them elderly, left “starving”, told to go to the toilet in their seat because nurses were too busy and relatives largely ignored while their loved ones died.

The charity said for every one of the 16 stories in its damning report it receives many more detailing similar levels of poor care at the hands of the NHS.

The cases included that of William Wood, 52, who was discharged from York District Hospital with severe pneumonia only to die at home on Christmas Day last year.

His wife, Sheila, said: “He told me that at one point during the night of December 18 he pressed the emergency button because his breathing had become so laboured he felt he was gasping for his life.

“It was a full 15 minutes before anyone responded to him. In my opinion, to take so long to answer when a patient is known to have breathing difficulties is atrocious. He could have died in that time.

“I still cannot understand how the seriousness of his condition went unnoticed. The Coroner’s report showed that my husband had chronic pneumonia, with one lung completely solid and another three parts solid. In a modern hospital, with all of the resources available to them, how does that get missed?”

Dr Alastair Turnbull, Medical Director for York Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, acknowledged “significant shortcomings in the discharge of Mr Wood” and added: “We are profoundly sorry that the standards of care our patients rightly expect of us were not met.”

Other cases raised by the Patients’ Association involving patients at different hospital across the country included several who died in agony because of inadequate pain relief. One patient had a “do not resuscitate” order put in her notes without her family’s permission, meaning nurses refused to help when she struggled to breathe.

Nurses were also found to have carried out procedures without telling patients what they were doing and one male patient had to forcibly refuse an injection that was being administered for a condition he did not have.

The report, which follows similar findings by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) and the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman, said: “In the 21st century, in one of the most developed countries and health systems in the world, patients should not be left starving or thirsty, they shouldn’t be left in pain and they shouldn’t be forced to urinate or defecate in their bed because the nurse designated to them says it’s easier for them to change the sheets later than to help them to the toilet now. Yet this is what is happening around the country every day.”

The Department of Health said it was determined to tackle poor performance in the NHS.