Family lost student to battle with anorexia

Victoria Hudson, from Meanwood, Leeds, returned from studying psychology at Huddersfield University feeling she needed to lose weight in 2004. Eight years later she died weighing just five and a half stones.

At the inquest into her death at Leeds Coroners Court yesterday, her parents Paul Hudson and Jacqueline Roberts, from Kippax, witnessed evidence on how the condition led to the student being sectioned under the Mental Health Act, abandoning her degree and dying at home alone.

The court heard Miss Hudson, 27, died after heart failure, which was likely a result of her illness.

Her mother Jacqueline said: “She had a dry sense of humour like me but it’s just the illness restricted everything really – we lost her eight years ago.”

Miss Hudson, who grew up in Kippax, was in and out of the Yorkshire Centre for Eating Disorders, at Seacroft Hospital, and was sectioned several times to help her gain weight.

She got a flat in Stonegate Chase, Meanwood, after leaving hospital in January 2011 and although she became isolated, she began studying a course in computing.

Miss Hudson continued to visit her GP but began cancelling outreach appointments. She was found dead at her flat on April 20.

Peter Johnstone, from Leeds Partnership NHS Trust, compiled a report stating her treatment was right “despite the conclusion”.

Issuing a narrative verdict, coroner David Hinchliff said: “She never fully complied with the treatment regime which had a major impact on her physical health and caused her death.”