Shocking six-year wait to get justice for NHS blunder

Six years ago George Andrews gave an interview to The Sunday Post after his partner Jean died in hospital.

He was angry, felt badly let down by the NHS and wanted action to prevent what he felt was another needless tragedy.

Six years on he has been fully vindicated, with the NHS being ordered to pay him more than £180,000 in compensation.

The judge who presided over the civil claim at the Court of Session was clear in his findings: that the NHS’s failure to admit Jean to hospital caused her death.

The case is a deeply troubling one and again shows the importance of listening to a patient’s family or indeed the patient.

George had repeatedly pleaded with one doctor that Jean was not simply suffering from a sickness bug, as the medic thought, but was gravely ill.

However, she was sent home where her condition deteriorated.

She was then rushed back into hospital but it was too late and she died following surgery.

Too often, we hear of cases where families – who know their relatives better than anyone – are ignored or seen as a hindrance.

In George and Jean’s case this had fatal consequences which were completely avoidable.

Yes, the courts have now found that the doctor involved was at fault and granted George compensation but that only goes so far.

George and Jean were in the autumn of their lives but they both still had a good few years ahead of them.

Those were years in which they would have enjoyed each other’s, and their family’s, company and prepared for the time that comes to us all in later life.

Instead, their final hours together were filled with anguish, pain, frustration and heartbreak.