Parents’ fury at ‘Third World’ NHS after daughter’s diet pills death
THE family of a young woman who died after taking toxic diet pills she bought online have condemned the Third World conditions at the ‘overcrowded, overwhelmed and understaffed’ hospital where she died.
Bethany Shipsey, 21, who had serious mental health problems, was rushed to A&E after telling a friend she had taken an overdose of the drug, known as DNP.
But she was left on a trolley in an overcrowded corridor before being seen by a junior doctor who was dealing with a drug he had ‘never seen before’.
Her mother Carole, 57, herself a nurse and midwife, said they felt ‘invisible’ and claimed hospital staff ignored their daughter while she ‘burned from the inside’ and her heart rate rocketed, reaching a peak of 180 beats per minute.
When she was admitted to the emergency department at Worcester Royal Hospital, the 22 beds there were full; seven people were on trolleys in corridors; ten more were still in ambulances waiting to be admitted.
Yesterday at an inquest in Stourport a coroner concluded there were ‘serious failings’ in Bethany’s care, including a failure by a doctor to call a special poisons hotline to find out how to treat the drug.
But he said that even if treatment had been better, it was likely Miss Shipsey would have still died. He recorded a verdict of suicide.
Afterwards her parents said they did not agree with the verdict and would challenge it.
They believe the overdose was a cry for help and that Miss Shipsey would have survived if she had been given better treatment.
In a statement read outside the inquest, Doug Shipsey, 52, a comually pany director, said: ‘Beth, our beautiful daughter, a sister, and an auntie, was full of plans for the future.
‘She was a naturally talented photographer and was looking forward to developing her own business as well as continuing her other passion in life, helping to rescue and rehome neglected and abandoned animals.
‘Beth was unlucky enough to be taken to an inadequate A&E department at the Worcester Royal Hospital, which was overcrowded, overwhelmed and understaffed, a First World Hospital in Third World circumstances. Even in A&E, Beth stood no chance of survival.
‘During the inquest, it became evident that a series of serious and significant failings led to Beth having a cardiac arrest, where she died on the same trolley on which she’d been aimlessly wheeled around the A&E department, in and out of the resuscitation room, along the overcrowded corridors in full public view. No dignity or privacy even in the last few minutes of her life.
‘The doctor should’ve made a simple phone call to the National Poisons Information service, which would’ve triggered a whole sequence of lifesaving actions, but this just didn’t happen; in fact, nothing was done to help save Beth’s life.’
He added: ‘As this is happening more and more across the UK, the Government blame winter pressures, but this is happening all year round. For as long as this situation is allowed to continue, the Government’s failure to tackle this makes them complicit in all the harm and death caused to patients, not winter pressures.’
Miss Shipsey had suffered from mental health issues after being sexargued assaulted by her ex-boyfriend, Barry Finch, 23, who was sentenced to six years in jail in August 2016.
She was on home leave from a psychiatric ward when she took the pills she had brought online from a man in Ukraine.
She was taken to hospital on February 15 last year after sending a friend a message on Facebook, saying she had taken 30 DNP tablets – although her family said she was prone to exaggeration. It was the 15th overdose she had attempted.
She was on a trolley before being taken to resuscitation, but then moved to another room to make room for other patients. At one point, a nurse told her she was having a panic attack and should calm down.
Her family said she was moved three times in 20 minutes before having a seizure and then a heart attack.
Mrs Shipsey said: ‘A couple of doctors stuck their heads into the cubicle then disappeared. They never spoke to me once. Bethany was looking at me. She called my name and said, “Mum, Mum, Mum”. It was like, “Help me”. Those were the last words she ever spoke to me.
‘ Then suddenly from this fast breathing I heard nothing. I went behind the curtain and rolled Beth over. She was white, her eyes open and her pupils like pinpoints.’
She added: ‘I knew from what I saw that she didn’t receive proper care. But I was her mother. I knew I was too emotionally involved. I thought the staff knew what they were doing.’
The coroner, Geraint Williams, said the ‘quantity of total care was significantly substandard’.
He had been asked by the Shipseys legal team to consider neglect. They that people who had taken a much higher dose than Bethany had survived with treatment.
The coroner said he agreed that the decision by Dr Alireza Niroumand not to consult Toxbase – a medical database about poisons – and not to notify colleagues about how serious it was amounted to ‘failings in basic medical care’.
But he said they did not amount to neglect and that even if treatment was given earlier, it was unlikely she would have survived.
Commenting on overcrowding, he said the issue was a ‘national one’ and not likely to change overnight.
Delivering his verdict, Mr Williams said: ‘The A&E was very busy. It was overwhelmed. It was not that the staff could not cope, it just meant that it took them longer to deal with each patient. They were not under-
‘Overwhelmed and understaffed’ ‘The last words she ever spoke to me’
staffed but they did not have enough staff for the over-capacity situation.
Mr Shipsey said he and his wife were prepared to meet Theresa May to discuss problems facing the NHS and the prospect of new laws to regulate the possession and sale of DNP.
He added: ‘It’s important that everyone knows that DNP is not actually a diet pill – it’s a lethal industrial compound with no known antidote which is inserted into capsules and illegally sold over the internet.
‘Beth was a wonderful young person with her whole life in front of her but she has been cruelly taken from us and from her world.’