Children of implant victim demand inquiry Don’t look, don’t see: Family mortem for first woman in the
The family of the first woman in the UK to have mesh listed as one of the causes of her death has demanded an inquiry into why a post mortem was not ordered.
They say the failure to fully investigate the death of 75-yearold Eileen Baxter last year is putting other women at risk as the prolapse mesh procedure is still being used in hospitals, despite use of other implants being suspended.
Mark Baxter and his sister, Audrey Thomson, want a Fatal Accident Inquiry (FAI) and the immediate halt to the use of the implant, which is inserted abdominally.
Painter and decorator Mark, 53, said: “Mum would have wanted lessons to have been learned from her death. “But nothing has been done because no post mortem was carried out.
“It’s hard to understand why such a vital opportunity has been lost. It feels like no one wants to ask the questions as they don’t want to know the answers.
“This is why we’re pressing for an FAI, so the truth about the safety of this mesh procedure is properly examined.”
They say they Eileen, a great grandmother from Loanhead, Midlothian, spent the last years of her life in agony after having an abdominal mesh procedure, sacrocolpopexy, in 2013. The pensioner was rushed into hospital last August where she suffered a perforated bowel, lapsed into a coma and died.
It was later discovered mesh had perforated her bladder and adhered to her bowel.
He r death certificate lists multiple organ failure, rectal perforation, pelvic inflammation with possible sepsis, and sacrocolpopexy mesh repair.
But a year after Eileen’s death, NHS Lothian cannot even tell her family which company made the mesh, never mind if the implant was defective .
E i leen ’s husband Chic,
80, said: “The medical people are turning cartwheels to play down the effect the mesh had on my wife.
“But I’ll go to my grave knowing that
was what killed her. I had to watch the torture and pain she went through on a daily basis from the moment they put that plastic inside her, and Eileen was convinced it was destroying her health.”
Her daughter Audrey, 51, said: “The day surgeons put mesh inside my mum was the day they delivered her death sentence. “For years she was in agony as the mesh slowly poisoned her body and cut into her organs. “Why they did not carry out a post mortem and save other families from having to