Harrowing account of Martha Mill's death at 13 in Guardian today

[StaplesCorner]

I don't think there's another thread on this already I did a search, but I think this needs to be widely read - there seems to have been no lack of NHS resources here whatsoever, but consultants' arrogance by the spade; shades of This is Going to Hurt? Every parents' worst nightmare:

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2022/sep/03/13-year-old-daughter-dead-in-five-weeks-hospital-mistakes

@XelaM
"And Dr Blunder haa been promoted a week after Martha's death, so now sees the more serious cases on a regular basis."

Excellent, now he will get more experience to better manage these cases. Isn't that what anyone would want, to stop a repeat of this situation?

"Very scary."

No, very sensible.
How do you think doctors learn, from Google ?!

To accuse me of "trolling" because I refuse to join in the emotive outpouring on this thread is ridiculous.

Some people refuse to accept either morbidity or mortality. They treat them as events that happen to other people.

Some people refuse to accept either morbidity or mortality. They treat them as events that happen to other people

This was a healthy thirteen year old girl killed by a medical blunder. Shame on you.

italktothetrees

You're bonkers. We don't promote without merit so more experience can be gained. We promote to reflect the experience and decision making powers that have been acquired in the post. Someone failing at one level should not be promoted until they're competently handling that level of responsibility, never more so than in relation to children's health. You wouldn't promote a slapdash, poorly informed nurse, it would be madness.
You really do sound like you talk to trees and should restrict yourself to this.

It seems to be a lottery with which staff you get on a given day you are taken poorly.
I nearly lost my dd aged 5 a few years ago but each and every staff member from the out of hours GP to the surgeons, nursing staff etc saved her after diagnosing her with an illness I had never heard of.

Fast forward to last August, my DH nearly died because of the incompetence of more than one staff member including A & E consultants, surgeons, nursing staff.

This was the same hospital and same A & E department.

It really is chance whether you get lucky or not.

RIP Martha

It is people refusing to accept negligent care. Do you really not understand the difference?

@Scianel
"This was a healthy thirteen year old girl killed by a medical blunder."

No.

She was, sadly, a very poorly girl who had suffered significant internal injuries before she arrived at the hospital. She showed an unusual presentation of a condition which staff struggled to address.

Please stop spreading misinformation.

Please stop spreading misinformation

After what you've posted on this thread, you are in no position to tell anyone else to stop posting anything.
I have no idea what your agenda is here but your posts are massively distateful and callous on a thread where several people have shared their extremely painful similar losses.

An internal injury that no other child had died of until that point.

And it wasn’t the injury that killed her, it was sepsis - something that could affect anybody, even someone in for a routine procedure.

The inquest found that doctors failed to heed the warning signs.
That seems quite clear doesn’t it @ITalktotheTrees

I don’t trust the nhs at all. We had a horrendous experience years ago where a life threatening condition was missed and we were lucky not to lose dd. That was bad enough but when we complained and pushed for more after the outcome of the complaint was unsatisfactory we found that they fabricated test results and notes we were absolutely disgusted as it was clear it took a number of people w ting together to do so - absolute corruption at all levels

@Mandeville2004
"It is people refusing to accept negligent care. Do you really not understand the difference?"

Yes, I do. But 'not accepting' it isn't going to make it go away.

Medical staff are human. They make mistakes. They always will make mistakes because they are not perfect. With the best will in the world this cannot be changed. However, it can be used to improve procedures, protocols, and give experience.

Even with exemplary treatment people still die.

The unusual complication of “bleeding from her cannulae” is because she was fucking septic, she was in multiple organ failure, her clotting cascade was so, so deranged that she couldn’t keep her blood in the compartments in her body where it’s meant to be, it was so watery that it was leaking out of her, she developed that rash in the late stages because her blood couldn’t even be contained in her capillaries by that point.

She was the first child to ever die with this type of injury on that ward, a specialist ward for children with pancreatic injuries, that tells us that children with the right care would normally survive these injuries. Martha didn’t get the right care.

If you’re a HCP then I absolutely despair, your understanding of sepsis and it’s progression through the later stages is so, so poor. If you were my colleague I would be raising concerns about your knowledge, your conduct, and your ability to put concerns for the patient above concerns for your own agenda.

@ZealAndArdour "If you’re a HCP then I absolutely despair, your understanding of sepsis and it’s progression through the later stages is so, so poor. If you were my colleague I would be raising concerns about your knowledge, your conduct, and your ability to put concerns for the patient above concerns for your own agenda."

I'm not a HCP, so please keep your ill-informed opinions to yourself.

Thank god for that 👏🏽

There is wilful misunderstanding from italktothetrees who seems likely to have skin in the game either from a medical or legal point of view.

As anyone reading the article carefully could see, the unusual aspect of the presentation is noted at this point, not because doctors were dealing with something challenging, rare and misleading in its presentation (as the poster tries to imply) but because this was yet another symptom that didn't fit the prevailing narrative and should have alerted medics to look more closely and consider other possibilities - like sepsis. Their rigid adherence to prior assumptions in the face of new evidence alongside a lack of timely networking led to an outcome that should never have happened. This doesn't mean that the writer thinks death is only for other people, simply that she believes (and the hospital agrees) that death should not have occurred on this occasion.

Trees posts are deeply callous, disrespectful and rather hard of thinking.

Some people refuse to accept either morbidity or mortality. They treat them as events that happen to other people

unnecessary deaths caused by medical negligence should absolutely be something people refuse to accept.

This wasn’t a child with injuries incompatible with life. This was a child that should have had a story to tell her friends when she went back to school.

The numerous opportunities to act that were missed and discarded should not be ignored.

Thank fuck for that.

Even with exemplary treatment people still die.

Sadly, a post about that is pretty irrelevant because the child in question didn't get it.

So very glad to hear you're not a HCP.

@ITalktotheTrees

You are the one not being subjective.

The corner herself said Martha’s death would have been preventable if she had been sent to PICU earlier.

The fact is there were failings in Martha’s care, which have been acknowledged by KCH.

Medical professionals need to be held accountable for their actions and decisions they make.

Such a harrowing read, I feel so much for poor Martha and her family, they must be haunted by this.

For those going on about private healthcare: you do realise it's mainly the same doctors from the NHS who are working a side-hustle in private health? These guys aren't going to become caring, diligent geniuses in the face of something more complicated than an elective procedure just because they are working under a different system. And the system will still close ranks and cover up when anything goes wrong.

Privatising the system just means that the cost of private healthcare and insurance will rocket, because with no NHS as an alternative the providers will introduce cartel-pricing (see energy bills for what companies charge when providing essential products).

Same doctors trying much harder in my experience. Much longer consultations, nicer manner, more freedom to investigate.

Thank you for providing the link to this story. Absolutely heartbreaking for this family who were cheated out of taking their beautiful child home.

Hopefully this will give medical staff a reason to do extra sepsis training. Lots of it.