‘Nye’s family would tell me to fight on with NHS complaint... I want more’
Six years after the ‘avoidable’ death of her husband at the University Hospital of Wales, MP Ann Clwyd is still looking for answers and accuses the health board of a ‘cover-up mentality’. Political editor David Williamson reports
CYNON Valley MP Ann Clwyd made headlines in 2012 when she claimed her husband died in “battery hen” conditions at the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff.
The veteran MP claims that a “cover-up mentality” is “all-pervasive” at the health board and pledged to continue her “battle” to get answers.
She said: “I knew that the NHS did not treat its complainants well, but I did not expect to be here still looking for answers nearly six years later.”
In 2014 an investigation did not uphold the majority of her allegations but the Labour MP accused the Cardiff and Vale University Health Board of a “dismissive, insulting and gratuitous attitude” towards the families of loved ones.
Speaking in the House of Commons, she described the final days of her husband, Owen Roberts, and said more than 4,500 people had written to her to share their experiences of the NHS complaints system.
A spokeswoman for the health board said: “We have met with Ms Clwyd on a number of occasions and feel that we have made every effort to address in full all the concerns she has raised, and shared with her all actions we have taken to address her concerns.”
Hansard records Ms Clwyd telling MPs: “The House will understand my sorrow at the loss of Owen.
“It is heartbreaking to find that the people whom we appoint to safeguard our services, and who benefit from a significant income and a highly respected position in our society are unable to address the failings of their organisation, engaging instead in obfuscation and half-truths.
“The cover-up mentality has to stop. We all make mistakes, but we should be ready to admit them. “My case is not unusual.”
She said: “He was admitted on Tuesday, October 9, 2012, to what should have been a caring and safe place. Instead, what we found was the opposite.
“I left Owen in what I thought was a place of safety, thinking that the hospital could care for him better than we could at home.
“How wrong I was. Owen went into the hospital mobile, yet spent two weeks crammed in a bed, on a cold, uncaring ward.”
Ms Clwyd told MPs about “abnormal blood results” and said there was evidence her husband, who went on to die of pneumonia, had an infection.
She said: “No-one saw Owen. No doctor saw him on Saturday.
“No doctor saw him on Sunday. By Monday it was too late.
“I think it is reasonable to assume that if Owen had received effective antibiotics when his inflammatory markers were increasing, he would have stood a fighting chance and would have survived that infection.”
Ms Clwyd said: “I believe that the decision of the board to refuse to release this document beforehand reflects its dismissive, insulting and gratuitous attitude to members of the public and to the families of loved ones.
“It reflects the overall cover-up mentality that is all-pervasive in this health board.”
She said an NHS consultant who helped her told her that “his level of care would be considered unacceptable, not only by the standards in place in 2012 but by the standards in place at the inception of the NHS in 1948”.
Ms Clwyd said: “Long before becoming a politician I was on the Welsh Hospital Board from 1970 to 1974 with people such as Arianwen Bevan-Norris, who was Aneurin Bevan’s sister, and Archie Lush, his agent, and I know what they would be saying to me today: ‘Carry on. Keep on going.’ They would not have accepted these kinds of answers.”
She said: “I knew that the NHS did not treat its complainants well, but I did not expect to be here still looking for answers nearly six years later... [More] than 4,500 people have written to me about NHS complaints, 500 of which related to the University Hospital of Wales.
“I am sorry to say that two of my close friends have since died at the same hospital, and complaints have been made about their treatment as well... I will continue to ask those questions on behalf of my family and of the many others who are grieving and who have not had answers.”
A spokesman from Cardiff and Vale University Health Board said: “We would once again like to offer our sincere condolences to Ms Clwyd on the sad death of her husband in 2012.
“Due to the gravity of the concerns raised by Ms Clwyd about her husband’s care, and in line with the complaints process for NHS Wales, we set up an independent panel to oversee an investigation.
“The panel was made up of Cardiff and the Vale of Glamorgan Community Health Council, the patient watchdog, Health Inspectorate Wales and an Independent Member of the Health Board.
“This led to the completion of a report, which due to our obligations to respect patient confidentiality, we are not in a position to release without the permission of Ms Clwyd.
“We believe, however, that there is a public interest in openness and transparency, given the extensive coverage this case has received and so we would reiterate our request to Ms Clwyd to make the report public.
“Following this report and in line with normal processes, we worked with Ms Clwyd and her solicitor to agree two external experts to independently review her concerns. This took place in 2014.
“There were no new issues arising from the external experts’ review. They concluded that the sad outcome was unavoidable.
“Ms Clwyd then took her complaint to the Public Services Ombudsman for Wales, who also reviewed her concerns. Again, similar findings were made and the UHB accepted this report in full and took all actions required.
“We have met with Ms Clwyd on a number of occasions and feel that we have made every effort to address in full all the concerns she has raised and shared with her all actions we have taken to address her concerns.
“I have read some of the reports of interviews she has given over the years since the death of her husband, and giving those interviews takes an enormous amount of inner courage. She certainly has my admiration...
“Frankly, patients and their loved ones can be nervous about complaining. Older people, in particular, often do not want, as they see it, to make a fuss.
“They can sometimes worry that, by complaining, their care may somehow be adversely affected, which is clearly not what [she], I or anyone else wants.
“By putting in place an open, transparent and confident complaints system, we can assure patients, young and old, that their complaints will be dealt with fairly and openly, and they need not fear raising them...
“I believe that the extra funding that we have announced, which will come to the Welsh Government, too, over the next five years, will present us with an opportunity to improve the patient experience across the country.”
A Welsh Government spokeswoman said: “Every complaint made to the NHS is taken seriously.
“We have a process in place that requires patients’ complaints to be thoroughly investigated in an open, honest and transparent way, with a strong focus on the involvement of the person raising the concern.
“There is a commitment to learning from complaints and improving procedures to prevent it happening again.”