UPDATE: |Family’s grief as ‘cherished nanna’ dies less than 12 hours after hospital discharge News

A coroner has ruled Margaret Laird would not have died had she not been discharged

A “cherished nanna” died less than 12 hours after being discharged from hospital, an inquest heard.

On March 13 last year retired hairdresser Margaret Lairde had been sent home from Royal Blackburn Hospital after 11 days.

She returned to hospital seven days later, and was then admitted three days later to the intensive care unit suffering from worsening respiratory failure.

Margaret had chronic obstructive pulmonary disease but lived an active life and enjoyed visiting her holiday home in Spain with her husband Steve.

But on March 28 she was moved to a respiratory ward, her condition having improved, and six days later she was deemed medically fit for discharge.

One the evening of April 5 at 5pm she returned to her home in Burnley but in the early hours of the following morning she told her husband that she couldn’t breathe and she collapsed. Despite the best efforts of paramedics she was pronounced dead, LancsLive reports.

An inquest into Margaret’s death concluded on Thursday (April 10) with her husband Steve and daughter, Rebecca, saying they had been “robbed”.

“From going from being on life support to being discharged in a matter of days shouldn’t have happened and we feel robbed,” Steve said.

The inquest heard that Margaret, 74, had been assessed before being discharged from ward C7 and was “really keen” to go home. However, husband Steve said she had been unable to get to the toilet on her own, and only felt safe walking if someone was next to her.

“My wife wasn’t able to walk without assistance,” Steve said. “She hadn’t gone to the toilet on her own and when I got there she had soiled herself because she’d been asking the nurses to help her.”

Margaret’s daughter Rebecca said the family had been told that the plan was for her to be discharged to a rehabilitation unit. “They said she wouldn’t be going anywhere until she could walk, unaided, the length of the corridor,” Rebecca added.

Area Coroner Kate Bisset highlighted “a number of areas of concern about Margaret’s care” and said: “I do not accept that it was safe to discharge Mrs Laird on the 5th April 2024.

“It seems to me that records and documentation were not accurate and up to date. This led to an over assumption of Mrs Laird’s capabilities and a discharge which, on the balance of probabilities, ought not to have occurred at the time at which it did.”

The coroner ruled that Margaret would not have died if she had not been discharged from hospital prematurely and returned a narrative conclusion in which she said: “I am satisfied that the discharge was premature, brought about in incomplete or inaccurate notes which led to assessments of mobility without a full picture of Mrs Laird’s condition and needs. As is sadly often the case.

“The decision to discharge Mrs Laird contributed to her death occurring at the time at which it did.”

After Margaret’s death her family described her as the “most precious mum of Baron, Rebecca and Jason, dear mother-in-law to Lynda, cherished nanna of Courtney, Claudia, Max and Poppy, also a very special sister, sister-in-law, auntie and beautiful friend of many”.

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