"Mass Euthanasia" at Derby Hospital

Lois Rogers reported in the Sunday Times on 8 Feb 04 that Peter Ashworth, the coroner for Derby, was demanding a public inquiry into claims that over a three week period 11 patients in the city's Kingsway Hospital were deliberately starved to death. An inquiry has been refused, but the inquest may take three months.

"The inquest has been delayed by two investigations, one by the hospital, which found no evidence of wrongdoing, and the other by Derbyshire police, which sent a file to the Crown Prosecutor Service (CPS). The CPS ruled that there was insufficient evidence to prosecute." Police are now awaiting the results of the inquest.

Relatives have rejected the health dept.'s offer to hold an internal inquiry. "Andrew Hughson said his 75 year-old father, also called Andrew, would vainly stretch his hand towards meals being delivered to other patients. 'We kept being told that feeding him would be bad for his general health, and he was too frail to tell us otherwise,' he said."

Dr. Claire Royston, clinical director of mental health services for the elderly for Bedfordshire and Luton NHS Community Trust, who will give evidence at the inquest, has concluded that the patients' deaths were "speeded up". She told Luton/Dunstable on Sunday "I didn't feel the way they had been looked after was in keeping with accepted practice at the time." Not quite within the GMC Guidelines, perhaps?