Trust failed to identify signs of infection in blood test

Summary 725 |

Mrs U complained that her mother, Mrs T, was not given adequate treatment when she was admitted to hospital with an infection and she was discharged despite having had a blood test that showed infection.


What happened

Mrs T was admitted to hospital with hip pain. Clinicians decided that it was appropriate to discharge her after about a week because they considered her to be clinically fit. After Mrs T's discharge, her final blood test result arrived at the ward. The result indicated signs of infection. Mrs T returned to hospital about a week later and was diagnosed with sepsis. She was treated, but deteriorated. She died a few days after readmission.

What we found

The Trust reasonably prepared Mrs T for discharge. However, in light of the significant results that arrived after Mrs T had left hospital, more should have been done to follow up her care after discharge. We believe this would have led to further treatment. We did not consider that it was likely that further treatment would have prevented Mrs T's death, but we felt that her family lost the opportunity to be reassured about this.

Putting it right

The Trust agreed to apologise to Mrs T's family, complete a clinical review to identify how to prevent anything similar happening again and give an update on a review it has started into how staff check blood tests after a patient's discharge.

Health or Parliamentary
Health
Organisations we investigated

Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust

Location

West Midlands

Complainants' concerns ?

Did not apologise properly or do enough to put things right

Result

Not applicable