Can't decide whether to have post mortem or not

[MarmaladeSunset]

I need to urgently decided on whether to request a post mortem from the hospital. My mum died in hospital last week, she was in a rehab hospital for a broken bone, was then admitted to hospital, took a week to die there.

During her time there she was diagnosed with delirium which is not a cause of death, it was obvious that nobody took her symptoms seriously, no effort was being made to find out what was wrong with her.

I've now been told cause of death is cerebro vascular disease - this to me sounds like their made up reason because they don't really know.

I was told by one dr that she was prescribed lorazapam and tramadol together at the previous hospital. Those two drugs together can cause respiratory depression and death (found this out using google, which says benzos and opioids together can cause this). I challenged hospital on this, medical officer has spoken to pharmacist who says he is confident that this isn't what has happened as the drugs would have been out of her system by the time of her death.

If I don't agree with their cause of death I can challenge it and presumably request a post-mortem to find out the actual cause. It's so difficult to decide what to do, I obviously don't have enough in-depth medical knowledge to know how long it takes to die of being given these two drugs together, the assumptions of the drs at the hospital may be correct.

Long shot but if anyone has any medical knowledge, or experience of this, or advice, I'd be keen to hear it.

Sorry to those of you who've experienced similar losses.

Her 'care' in hospital was shocking, so I can't help feeling a lack of trust in the drs opinion on her cause of death.

I am guessing this is central to your thinking. I do know exactly what you mean. When my late OH was in hospital I was appalled at the lack of care. I, or one of our DDs, was with him in hospital throughout every day as it was clear they had no clue about care of someone with Parkinsons and the need for drugs to be given on time and in a manner he could swallow - and for his food to be placed where he could reach it! - and so much more - e.g. 45 minutes on a bedpan because there were no staff to get him off it.

If the care had been good OP I think you might have felt more confident in the cause of death - but being witness to chaotic care definitely saps confidence in the system. I hope that the coroner will be helpful and you will be able to feel some peace.

I wondered how things went with the Coroner OP?

I hope you are ok x

Have the PM.

I'm sorry for your loss. If you think you will regret not knowing, then do it. Maybe someone else can read the post mortem and summarise for you.

I am not a medic, but in what way was the care shocking? Could she have had a bladder infection (hence delirium) that developed I to sepsis - did they do blood tests?

Thanks for checking in. No cause of death was found on the initial PM, but tissue samples were sent off for analysis, when they've been analysed the full report can be written and hopefully the cause of death will be established.

Sorry for your loss.

Bit late to this, but I am glad you have referred to the coroner, as hopefully the cause can be shown NOT to be cerebrovascular disease, because if there is a family incidence it can affect your (and your children's) life assurance premiums in the future if there is a family history of strokes, which does have to be declared when applying.

There was a post-mortem after my father died. He died in hospital.
We had no choice in the matter.

Isn't there usually an inquest when somebody dies unexpectedly? Even in hospital, in my local area, if somebody dies in hospital without an obvious cause being evident, then it automatically triggers an inquest.
Our local inquest hearings are listed online and when I needed to look at it once, there was quite a few people who had their unexplained death listed as being at the local hospital.