Rider suffered fatal brain injury when she fell from horse
SHE HAD BEEN DRINKING ON MORNING OF ACCIDENT
A PROFESSIONAL horse trainer “suddenly felt dizzy” when she fell from a horse and suffered a fatal brain injury, an inquest heard.
Annette Elizabeth Day, an experienced horse rider, had been riding in an arena at Lambley Paddocks, Lambley Road, Lowdham, when her husband, Andrew, heard a change in the footfall of the horse.
Nottingham’s Coroner’s Court heard on Thursday at the inquest completion into Mrs Day’s death that the horse’s footfall had alerted Mr Day that something was wrong.
He found his wife lying on the floor and asked her if she was OK and she said she was not hurt.
She said she was on the horse when she “suddenly felt dizzy” and was on the floor.
No damage was found on the helmet the 60-year-old had been wearing and the fall was into soft sand.
The inquest heard Mrs Day had said “let’s go back to the house”. Mr Day got the car and they drove back to their home at Lambley Paddocks but then she fainted.
Mr Day, also a professional horse trainer, rang emergency services and his wife was taken to Nottingham’s Queen’s Medical Centre.
Mrs Day was unconscious and incubated. She had bleeding over the surface of her brain and nothing surgically could be done to assist.
“Her brain injury was thought to be unsurvivable,” said Dr Elizabeth Didcock, one of the assistant coroners for Nottingham and Nottinghamshire.
Dr Didcock said: “He (her husband) reports she was a long-term alcoholic and drank about half-a-bottle of spirits a day. On the day of the fall, she drank a double measure of Gin and Tonic at 6am.
“He was unsure she had a traumatic fall from the horse, as there were no marks on the helmet, and the reins were in the middle of the horse’s neck”.
She fell from the horse at around 4.30pm on May 14 this year, two days before her death in hospital.
The fall was not witnessed but her husband was close by.
The cause of death was (1a) bleeding into the brain and around it; (1b) fall from horse; (1c) alcohol intoxication.
Toxicology showed she had 173 milligrams of alcohol per 100 millilitres of blood - the legal limit being 80 for driving. She had been drinking since that morning.
Dr Didcock concluded her death was accidental and referred to the intracranial haemorrhage caused by a fall when intoxicated by alcohol.
“I suspect indeed it was the alcohol that led to the fall,” she added.