Trust failed to take appropriate action to diagnose woman's heart attack

What happened

Mrs P became unwell in late 2011 with severe pain between her shoulder blades and an ambulance was called. A paramedic arrived first, followed by an ambulance crew. At that time Mrs P had no chest pain or any symptoms consistent with a heart attack. She was taken by ambulance to A&E at South London Healthcare NHS Trust where she was diagnosed with likely musculoskeletal pain and sent home with painkillers.

Mrs P remained unwell and went to her GP who referred her to the Trust for an ECG. This was carried out in early 2012 when she was diagnosed with cardiomyopathy and given medication.

What we found

Mrs P showed no signs of having had a heart attack, and so we found no fault with the initial assessments made by the paramedics and ambulance staff.

It was likely that Mrs P had indeed suffered a heart attack the day she went to hospital, but no tests that might have diagnosed this were conducted in A&E. This could have had very serious consequences for Mrs P, but the Trust failed to identify or acknowledge the risk to her.

Putting it right

South London Healthcare NHS Trust has apologised and paid compensation of £1,250. It has put a plan in place to learn lessons from the failings and make sure they do not happen again.