THE family of cancer victim Lily Smith say they will never forgive the NHS after she spent 12 hours of the last day of her life on a hospital trolley.
The 83-year-old great grandmother’s final wish was to be allowed to die in peace at her Newstead home after she was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer last December. But an ambulance was called when she suddenly took a turn for the worse after contracting pneumonia. Lily then spent nine hours in a corridor at the Royal Stoke University Hospital’s A&E before spending a further three hours on a trolley at the Medical Assessment Unit.
She passed away just three hours after finally being placed on the Clinical Decision Unit on March 25. Now her devastated relatives have questioned why more was not done to make their dying mother’s last hours more comfortable. One of her four surviving children, Ian Smith, said he will always regret dialling 999 when his mother started to have difficulties breathing.
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Lily Smith
Filed under: A&E, Elderly, NHS, NHS Blunders, A&E, Elderly, NHS
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