Dementia gran is sent home in taxi half- naked
Terry Dawson with his wife Sylvia, who he said was treated ‘ with callousness’ A DEMENTIA- stricken grandmother was sent home from hospital in a taxi – naked but for a flimsy bed gown.
Bungling medical staff also gave the driver the wrong address for 76- yearold Sylvia Dawson, who was alone.
She could not tell him where she lived and the driver frantically tried to locate her husband Terry, 80.
Mrs Dawson finally arrived distressed at her front door in a rainstorm, clutching the plastic bag of clothes staff at the Carlisle hospital had not bothered to dress her in.
Yesterday health chiefs at North Cumbria NHS Trust apologised “wholeheartedly” for the mother- ofthree’s treatment after a fall.
Tragically, within two days of her ordeal, Sylvia’s condition deteriorated and she is now in residential care, unlikely to return home to Appleby.
Last night heartbroken Mr Dawson, a retired IT consultant, said he was “resentful, disillusioned and shattered” by his wife’s treatment. “It is beyond belief,” he said. “I can’t imagine what staff were thinking when they put her into that taxi, undressed, when it was very cold, pouring with rain and blowing half a gale. She was clearly distressed and stark naked save for a hospital gown and light wrap.” He added: “It was the sheer callousness of the way they sent her home, shipping her off in the nearest cattle wagon they could find.”
In August, Mrs Dawson, a former office manager who has eight grandchildren, was assessed by carers and a psychologist and was unable to answer the simplest of cognitive questions.
Mr Dawson said it should have been “obvious to anyone at A& E” that his wife would not know her correct address.
Cumberland Infirmary, Carlisle, failed to update medical records and sent Sylvia to a former address after treating her head wound.
It was only because she had kept the same telephone number that the cab driver finally located her house.
Mr Dawson has also complained to the Care Quality Commission which is already investigating the NHS trust after it featured in the Keogh Review and was put into special measures.
The trust said: “The circumstances around Mrs Dawson’s discharge are clearly unacceptable and do not meet the high standards of safe and compassionate care that we aim to provide.”
An investigation has begun.