EHB official loses negligence claim against Meath Hospital

EVIDENCE of a hospital having failed to treat a patient as gently as he may have expected falls short of establishing a claim…

EVIDENCE of a hospital having failed to treat a patient as gently as he may have expected falls short of establishing a claim in professional negligence, a judge has held.

Judge Raymond Groarke dismissed, with costs, an action for £30,000 damages against the Meath Hospital, Dublin, by an Eastern Health Board official.

Judge Groarke said Mr Seamus Kearns, of Lissadel Avenue, Drimnagh, Dublin, had failed to produce evidence substantiating claims he had been left unattended for seven hours in the emergency unit before being admitted, that he had been wrongly diagnosed, improperly treated and insulted and abused by two nurses.

Mr Kearns said he had been kept in the Meath for two days before it was discovered he had a malignant brain tumour which had been successfully removed on the third day following transfer to Beaumont Hospital.

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He claimed he had been misdiagnosed as suffering from depression. On a visit to the toilet he had collapsed and had been left lying on the floor, unable to get up, while two nurses refused to assist him and insulted him about his weight.

Judge Groarke said the seniors nurse had, for 20 minutes, encouraged Mr Kearns to get up himself before sending for two porters. She had admitted she would not again adopt this attitude. Mr Kearns had agreed that because of his weight it would have been impossible for the two nurses to lift him.