Clodagh Bradley QC, instructed by Iona Meeres-Young, Partner at Fieldfisher, represented the family of a 38 year old mother of two who was admitted to Basildon hospital, Essex, 15 weeks pregnant, with premature rupture of the membranes, and who went on to develop sepsis. She had not been offered a termination of pregnancy on admission, as she should have been, and she was not reviewed by a consultant until 3 days after her admission, even after sepsis had been diagnosed on her second day of admission.

The Coroner concluded that there was ineffective communication, a lack of senior review and escalation to senior or multi-disciplinary clinicians and that the Trust did not follow its own (out of date) guidelines or the NICE guidelines on sepsis, which were all factors contributing to Mrs Saidha developing septic shock, disseminated intravascular coagulopathy and multi-organ failure, leading to her death on her fourth day of admission. The Coroner will be writing a Prevention of Future Deaths report to Basildon & Thurrock University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.

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