Wednesday 24 July 2013

Liverpool Care Pathway - Cast Iron Protection

Those who have advocated and backed this Death Pathway are also culpable, equally blameworthy. They should be shackled and carted off to the tower...

 But they will deny everything and the public-funded NHS LA will fight their corner to the bitter end.

 Those who represent us have shown themselves for what they are: self-serving, self-seeking, disgusting people. What thought have they for people like Pat Jones whose husband, Jack, had his life taken by one of Chairman Ellershaw's own team?

 Pat was fighting for justice. Pat depended on legal aid to fight her case. Lawyers don't fight cases for justice but for financial outcomes. They told her, you take the cash or you'll lose the legal aid.

 And that's all Jacks life was worth. Eighteen grand.

 Pat's daughter called it manslaughter. Well, you might call it that...

 A driver might be up on a manslaughter charge killing someone on the road. If the driver's passenger kept shouting warnings to the driver to stop and the driver refused to listen, that might well be called murder.

 Chairman Ellershaw's politburo crony, Ms. Coackley, in like manner, ignored - blatantly ignored - the pleas of Jack's family and still pressed ahead on her Pathway.

 Then that is not manslaughter; that is murder.

 And what of May James, who fought to keep her husband David on treatment? David's family took the hospital to court in a battle to fight for his life.
A grandfather has died just ten days after his family lost a legal battle that allowed his hospital to withhold treatment if his condition deteriorated.

David James, 68, walked into his local hospital last May with suspected constipation but never left after developing hospital acquired pneumonia and blood poisoning.

Within weeks he was in intensive care and was left unable to speak or breathe unaided.

Last summer the hospital trust - which cannot be named for legal reasons - launched a rare legal action seeking permission to withdraw potentially life-saving treatment from Mr James. 
His appalled family insisted Mr James, a professional musician, still enjoyed life and was not ready to die leading to a judge rejected the hospital trust's application.

But the trust won an appeal against the decision days before Christmas meaning treatment could be withheld from Mr James if his condition deteriorated.

His daughter Julie, 48, described the ruling as 'legalised murder'.
- Mail Online
Legalised murder. Murder on the LCP Express! And when are the drivers of this murderous machine going to be brought to justice? No time soon; they have the cast-iron protection of the public-funded, government-backed NHS LA to fight their corner.

Hospitals will today be told to review the treatment of every patient who has been on the controversial Liverpool Care Pathway after an independent review found examples of abuse across the NHS.
The Department of Health will tell hospitals to refer doctors to the General Medical Council if they find the procedures have been abused.- The Telegraph
Really...?

The hospitals don't know who was on the Pathway!

  GLA Conservatives found -

38% of trusts (8) could not say how many patients were on the LCP

81% of trusts (17) could not provide the number of patients who wereremoved from the LCP and/or survived

81% of trusts (17) could not give the longest and shortest periods that patients were on the LCP

38% of trusts (8) could not provide any of the requested information on patients on the pathway

Andrew Boff, Leader of the GLA Conservatives, Londonwide Assembly Member and author of the report said:
"It is a scandal that we could not find basic information on the some of the most vulnerable people, those over 65 years of age, on the Liverpool Care Pathway. We are talking about straightforward figures that should be readily available in the public domain - the number of deaths on the LCP, the length of time that patients are cared for on it, and the number of patients that are removed from it. Trusts should be required to record this information regularly, clearly and concisely, and the clinical commissioning groups should make sure that they do this.


130,000 patients are placed on the LCP each year and the paperwork isn't there. Where it is, it is mostly slapdash or incomplete. This is not evidence-based medicine. But this is what they have to go on. A botched human experiment gone wrong.

 Putting faces to names
Alan Hardwick, now 71, from Sedgefield, was already beside himself with worry after a non-cancerous lung infection which started in 2008 turned out in 2010 to be lung cancer.
Bitter that doctors had missed the cancer for so long, he became horrified when he realised that hospital staff had put Sharon on the Liverpool end-of-life pathway without telling her next-of-kin.
Between July and October staff started to reduce his wifes medication, food and fluids.
"They were trying to withdraw food and fluids without telling the family," he added. 
The family eventually got Sharon transferred to Sedgefield General Hospital where she died in October last year.
Andrew Cummings, 80, from Darlington, was unaware that his wifes care in her dying days at Darlington Memorial Hospital involved withholding fluids.
His wife, Audrey, was admitted to the Darlington hospital with a urine infection in September last year before being diagnosed with severe heart problems.
He recalled being called into a room and a doctor told the family there was nothing more they could do for her and she was going to receive palliative care.
"My son and daughter came down and realised Audrey was not getting anything to eat or drink," he told The Northern Echo.
"It was like the secret service, you are the relative but no one tells you anything. The Liverpool Care Pathway wasnt mentioned because the first time I heard of it was after she died and realised that was what had happened to her."
David Emerton, medical director for North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Foundation Trust said he was "sorry" that Mr Hardwick felt let down by the care his wife received and invited him to contact officials to discuss the case.
Mike Wright, director of nursing at County Durham and Darlington NHS Foundation Trust offered condolences to Mr Cummings for the loss of his wife and acknowledged that staff could have communicated better.- The Northern Echo

- BBC
16 July 2013 Last updated at 12:05 BST
Care minister Norman Lamb has called for a police investigation into the unexplained death of a mother-of-six in a hospice.
The family of Andrea West, 35, from Norfolk, refuse to believe she died from cancer and claim she was put on the end of life treatment plan, the Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP).
Now two independent pathologists have discovered significant morphine levels in her body a drug which was not prescribed and was not in her hospice medical records.
A Norfolk Community Health and Care NHS Trust spokesman denied Mrs West was on the LCP but said it took the family's concerns "very seriously".

16 July 2013 Last updated at 23:28
Andrea West died at Priscilla Bacon Lodge in Norwich last year. An inquest into her death has been opened and adjourned.
- BBC
Norman Lamb, North Norfolk MP, has said there should be an investigation.
Norfolk Police said the case was subject to a coroner's inquiry and had not been referred to them.
Mrs West's family said the mother-of-six had been diagnosed with cervical cancer and had been placed on the Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP) end-of-life treatment plan. The Norfolk Community Health & Care NHS Trust disputed that she was on the programme.
Mrs West died on 20 September, five days after being admitted to the hospice for symptom control and for treatment of an infection.
Her family has challenged the original pathologist's report that the cancer killed her.
Two other reports, one commissioned by the BBC, concluded that, on balance, morphine and other drugs caused her death.
A Norfolk Police spokesperson said: "This matter is currently the subject of a coroner's investigation and has not been referred to Norfolk Constabulary for investigation.
"As there is an ongoing legal process it would be inappropriate to comment further".

- Telegraph and Argus
6:00am Wednesday 17th July 2013
A Bradford woman whose elderly mother died after being placed on the now-discredited Liverpool Care Pathway has told of her delight that the policy is being scrapped.
Mother-of-three Joan Flynn, who had just become a great-grandmother, died in the Royal Preston Hospital aged 90.
Mrs Flynn, who lived in Bolton, Bradford for more than 50 years had suffered a fall at her Lancashire home.
Her daughter Susan Brook, 61, of Eccleshill, said she was placed on the Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP) and a ‘do not resuscitate’ order was placed on her without any consultation with her family.
When her family realised what was happening, they pleaded with doctors to take her off the LCP which they did.
But, Mrs Flynn died on Sunday, July 24, 2011, six days after being admitted to hospital with a suspected broken rib.

According to legal compensation expert Philip Needham of Bradford -
“This situation falls under the Fatal Accidents Act in which a dependent relative would only ever be entitled to a maximum payout of £5,000,” Mr Needham said.

“And the relative has to prove they were financially dependent on the old people, therefore the numbers involved will be very small.” - Telegraph and Argus

Only five grand...

 What's a human life worth? That's the current economic climate for you.

It's not about the money, money
We don't want the money, money
We just wanna put the world right
We're gonna fight the good fight

You can keep your money, money
You can stick your money, money
You dip your fingers in our pockets, alright,
But you won't bruise our spirit to fight

[Chorus]
Everybody movin' to the left
Everybody movin' to the right
But you, you're all upwing
And we, we're all downwing

So you can keep your price tag
Cos we ain't got no price tag
We're gonna fight you till the truth's out
Till the truth chokes you and the world's right

[with apologies to Jessie J]
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