2024-07-29 09:46:14
The court official who investigated the case concluded that the medical institution did not take proper care of the patient who waited for emergency medical help for 8 hours.
Coroner Elizabeth Didcock concluded Ms Rublite died of natural causes, but said two opportunities to establish a diagnosis had been missed.
Hospital representatives agreed with the finding and added that they “sincerely regret not having met the standards we aim to ensure”.
The deceased was a mother of 2 children, raised 11 and 13-year-old sons, who are now being cared for by their widowed father.
Two missed opportunities
January 19 Ms. Rublite called 911 because she had severe head and neck pain and blurred vision.
The woman was advised to come to the hospital, where a neighbor brought her around 10 p.m. 30 minutes
Medical center staff last assessed her condition at 2 p.m. of the night Ms. Rublite was called by name 3 times between 4 p.m. 30 minutes and 6 a.m. 50 min but no answer.
The facility staff probably decided that the patient had gone home and registered that she had been discharged. However, the woman was soon found slumped on the floor with a coat covering her head.
“The staff didn’t do anything about her. And when they found her, it was already too late,” Inese Briede, the sister of the deceased who lives in Latvia, told The Guardian.
The coroner said that the nurse initially assessed the patient’s condition properly when she arrived at the emergency department.
However, a subsequent discussion with a medical staff member about her symptoms, after which the patient was not referred for a CT scan, was considered a missed opportunity.
2 hours after the second inspection. on the night Ms Rublite reported severe pain, her care was not stepped up, which the coroner said was a second missed opportunity.
Ms Didcock added that she was surprised by the reaction to a patient in the emergency room not responding to the invitation. In her opinion, the invitation should be repeated more often, every 10-15 minutes.
Crowded hospital corridors
But Ms Didcock said that if Ms Rublite had been admitted to hospital as she should have been, she would still have suffered a “second and rapid, devastating haemorrhage” on the brain.
The emergency department at Queen’s Medical Center was overcrowded and understaffed on the night of the incident, the inquest heard.
Although the emergency department has a capacity of 36 people, when Ms. Rublite arrived, 76 patients were waiting for help.
Ms. Didcock pointed out that many of the problems revealed in the case were beyond the control of the institution’s administration.
“We would like to express our sincere condolences to Inga’s family for their loss. Although the nature of the brain bleed would have made it unlikely that the outcome would have been different, we recognize that Inga’s care was lapses and we sincerely regret that we did not meet the standards we strive for,” said Manjeet Shehmar, the hospital’s medical director.
“We recognize that there are times when our hospitals are under significant strain, which can impact the patient experience. Our teams continue to work hard to maintain safe services and improve flows across our facilities. We apologize to patients who are delayed in providing assistance, and we continue to prioritize those patients who need assistance the most,” explained M. Shehmar.
“We completed a study to evaluate and implement the lessons learned, which has led to changes in our emergency department to ensure better patient care in the future.”
We fully agree with the coroner’s conclusions and are determined to take all possible steps to take better care of our patients,” M. Shehmar assured.
Long waiting lines in hospital admissions are a serious problem in the UK. Studies show that queues lead to more deaths. According to the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, almost 14,000 deaths could have been prevented in England last year. deaths when patients waited up to 12 hours for help in the hospital.
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2024-07-29 09:46:14