EXCLUSIVE

by Aline Nassif

aline.nassif@essnmedia.co.uk

More than 50 "grossly exceptional" incidents at Mayday Hospital were placed under investigation last year.

These cases – called Serious Untoward Incidents (SUIs) – range from unexpected deaths to delayed test results and faulty equipment to infection outbreaks.

Hospital chief Denise Chaffer admits "numbers are high" but wants even more patients and staff to come forward if they know of other cases so Mayday can "learn and improve".

The Advertiser can today reveal the breakdown of SUIs, but only those that have already been exposed by this paper can be discussed in any detail.

SUIs – the equivalent of Serious Case Reviews for social services that investigate shocking incidents such as the tragic Baby P case – are shrouded in secrecy.

But we can confirm the tragic deaths of young mum Louise Sharp, from New Addington, and 17-year-old Steven Deans, from Shirley, are under investigation.

They are among 10 SUIs involving "unexpected deaths" between April 2008 and March 2009.

Three of these are still under investigation, three were found to in fact NOT be unexpected and the other four have been concluded, although Mayday will not reveal the findings, for patient confidentiality reasons.

Both Louise and Steven died in December after their brain infections were allegedly misdiagnosed several times.

Louise, a nurse, visited Mayday four times in December, complaining of severe vomiting, headaches and increasing immobility, but her family claim she received no proper diagnosis.

And Steven was said to have been turned away with painkillers despite "agonising" headaches for four months before he died.

Other SUIs include 12 "infection-related issues", such as MRSA and C-diff outbreaks.

One SUI into "loss of confidential information" relates to the case of a stolen laptop that, despite being protected by a password, was open at the time of theft.

A further SUI - which is also the subject of a police investigation - follows an allegation that a "vulnerable" 94-year-old woman was mistreated by four nurses at Mayday in January.

It is claimed the four staff left the elderly patient with bruising during treatment following a fall.

An extra 24 SUIs are looking into unexpected "but not necessarily preventable" stillbirths or miscarriages.

Two SUIs relate to the accuracy of diagnostic tests, where the hospital was forced to offer repeat tests or consultations.

The long list of SUIs is down to the hospital's "culture of openness", says Ms Chaffer, Mayday's director of infection prevention and control.

She said: "Numbers are high because we encourage staff to report all incidents.

"And we want even more to come forward so the (Mayday Healthcare NHS) Trust can learn and make improvements.

"What interests us in SUIs is how the incident happened, and not who to blame, and how we can prevent it happening again.

"More often than not with these SUIs, we find the hospital did everything it possibly could in the circumstances and nothing could have been done to prevent the actual outcome."

Every SUI is reviewed by a team of in-house medical specialists, and their findings passed on to a national board of inspectors at NHS London.

The in-house team's report also goes to Mayday's Risk Management Committee, which details an action plan for each case and meets monthly to ensure instructions are being carried out.

Positive action as a result of SUI investigations has included a private room for grieving mothers, additional training in the detection of whole body inflammation, a more rigorous system of scoring patients' conditions to detect sudden deterioration, increased use of isolating contagious patients and the replacement of faulty equipment.