Health Service Commissioner : Second report for Session 1981-82 : Selected investigations completed October 1981-March 1982.

  • Great Britain. Health Services Commissioner.
Date:
1982
Catalogue details

Licence: Open Government Licence

Credit: Health Service Commissioner : Second report for Session 1981-82 : Selected investigations completed October 1981-March 1982. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    one at home to look after her. The SHO answered that the patient was a social problem and that the hospital would get in touch with the social services department (the SSD). Soon after this a staff nurse told the com- plainant’s mother that they had arranged for a ‘welfare officer’ to be at home when they arrived there. 4. The complainant’s mother said that on their return home she contacted the SSD but they said that they did not know anything about the patient’s discharge. She also telephoned the family doctor (the FP) because the hospital had given her a letter addressed to him. The FP asked her to take that letter to his surgery, but the complainant’s mother told my officer that she could not leave the patient who spent the night wrapped up in front of the fire. She said that at 7.45 next morning a district nurse (the DN) called and said that in view of the patient’s condition she could not accept responsibility for her continued welfare at home. The DN called an ambulance and the patient was admitted to the hospital immediately and died there later that day. 5. In his reply of 3 April 1981 to the complaint the acting district administrator (the ADA) said that after her arrival at the hospital at 8.59 am the patient was seen first by the A and E doctor and later by the SHO. The SHO had taken her medical history, made a full examination, assessed the results of tests, and concluded that there was no medical condition requiring her immediate admission. He had also taken a social history which had indicated that she had a home help, was visited twice-weekly by a district nurse and was seen regularly by neighbours and by her daughter. The SHO had felt that the patient needed more support at home and there- fore the community nursing service (the CNS) had been telephoned and in turn they agreed to alert the district nursing department. The ADA explained that he could not obtain the SHO’s comments as he had by then left the hospital but he said that the consultant physician (the physician) had formed the opinion from the medical notes that the patient’s condition had worsened after her discharge on 31 December, as on her admission she had congestive heart failure for which immediate treatment was begun. 6. My officer was unable to interview the SHO because he had died in a road accident in February 1981 but I have seen that his entries in the medical records for 31 December conclude as follows :— ‘I can find no medical condition requiring stat admission. Recommend [increased] social services. —S. services to be informed —letter to [FP].’ I have also seen a copy of the letter which the SHO sent to the FP. It provides details of his findings based on the hospital tests and his examina- tion of the patient but no mention is made of the SSD. The letter also said that the SHO understood that the patient had a home help, that the district nurse attended twice a week and that she had visits from a neighbour. He concluded that since she had seen the geriatrician in the past, if her condition deteriorated then they might wish to admit her for rehabilitation.
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