Gran dies after being given wrong blood but hospital ‘covers it up for five years’
A HOSPITAL has been accused of a five-year cover-up over the death of a grandmother given the wrong type of blood after routine surgery.
Doris Knight, 85, died after being admitted to the Horder Centre in East Sussex for a knee replacement operation in August 2007.
But her devastated family did not discover she had received a transfusion of mismatched blood until October 2012, when detectives told them a whistleblower – understood to be a former doctor at the private hospital – had come forward to reveal the truth.
Being given the wrong type of blood is labelled a ‘never event’ by the NHS – because it is so bad it should never happen.
After widowed Mrs Knight was given the transfusion she suffered breathing problems and loss of consciousness, before being transferred to Kent and Sussex
‘Killed by a simple operation’
‘This is inexcusable’
Hospital in Tunbridge Wells with suspected cardiac arrest. But doctors there – who did not know about the catastrophic error – could not save her and she died on August 23, 2007. Her family were left to believe it was an unavoidable tragedy.
The Horder Centre conducted an internal investigation which found Mrs Knight was given the wrong type of blood and this had played a part in her death – but this was withheld from the coroner and the pathologist who performed the post-mortem, according to the family’s lawyers.
After the whistleblower’s revelation, police investigated Mrs Knight’s death and no grounds for criminal charges were found. But an inquest is likely to be opened later this year or early next year.
Horder Healthcare ‘categorically refutes any suggestion of a “cover-up” or wrongdoing’ and said it had ‘fully co- operated’ with the police and Care Quality Commission – but refused to explain how the wrong type of blood came to be given to Mrs Knight ahead of an inquest.
Grandmother- of- three Mrs Knight, of East Grinstead, West Sussex, was admitted to the Horder Centre – a private hospital in Crowborough which performs operations subcontracted from the NHS – on August 20, 2007. Her son Paul Knight, 65, said that after the operation ‘she told me that “something was wrong”. Despite reassurances from the nursing staff I was very worried’.
He added: ‘My fears were confirmed by the need to transfer her as well as the suspiciously brief and anonymous call which I received and the defensive tone of the nurse when I questioned her.’ Of her death he said: ‘I felt agitat- ed ... I had not been given an explanation as to why a simple knee operation could kill my mother.’
The post-mortem showed Mrs Knight’s death was due to congestive heart failure, chronic ischemic hypertensive heart disease, resolving pneumonia and knee surgery.
Lawyer Peter Stefanovic of Simpson Millar, who is representing the family, said: ‘The Knight family and the pathologist who conducted the post-mortem were not told that Mrs Knight had been given mismatched blood and the coroner was not notified, even when the hospital realised its mistake. This is inexcusable.’
Mrs Knight was O Positive, but was given A Negative blood. If O patients are given A blood, clotting can occur throughout the body, shutting off the blood supply to vital organs.
Only one or two deaths a year on average occur from being given the wrong blood type, according to NHS figures. Horder Healthcare said Gordon Laboratory Group Limited (GLG) provided the Horder Centre’s pathology services, such as blood samples.
A spokesman from the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency said they launched an inspection into the Horder Centre in November 2008 following a report which ‘indicated errors in pre-transfusion testing, potentially placing patients at risk’. This led to an ‘immediate “cease and desist” notice … that prevented pretransfusion testing. The Horder Centre was subsequently placed under increased surveillance’.
But Horder Healthcare said the notice was issued to GLG – a separate company – and the Horder Centre ‘was not issued any “cease or desist” notice’. GLG could not be reached for comment.