{"id":576051,"date":"2026-03-31T09:58:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/576051\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T09:58:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:58:12","slug":"inquest-into-mackay-grandmothers-death-hears-of-shortcomings-in-private-hospitals-after-hours-staffing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/576051\/","title":{"rendered":"Inquest into Mackay grandmother’s death hears of ‘shortcomings’ in private hospital’s after-hours staffing"},"content":{"rendered":"

A coroner has found a 78-year-old woman who died at a private hospital in Queensland did not receive appropriate overnight care for a “very rare” complication from surgery.<\/p>\n

Robyn Ann Beale’s airway became blocked after an operation to remove part of her thyroid at the Mater Private Hospital Mackay (MPHM) on August 3, 2021.<\/p>\n

Ms Beale died less than 24 hours after the hemithyroidectomy.<\/p>\n

The inquest heard she suffered an acute post-surgical arterial bleed in her neck when she “coughed after swallowing a pain relief tablet”.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

The coroner said the hospital had been “transparent” about its shortcomings. (ABC Tropical North: Liam O’Connell)<\/p>\n

Coroner Carol Lee found the hospital relied on after-hours doctors who were not confident or equipped to handle the complication.<\/p>\n

In findings handed down on Tuesday, Magistrate Lee said MPHM had inappropriate staffing, inadequate patient monitoring and inadequate medical coverage between 10pm and 8am.<\/p>\n

But she found Ms Beale would have died even if this were not the case.<\/p>\n

Post-surgery care gone wrong<\/p>\n

General surgeon William Fitzgerald, who operated on Ms Beale, told the inquest there had been no significant bleeding or concern when he finished the surgery.<\/p>\n

\"Three<\/p>\n

William Fitzgerald (back left) performed thyroid surgery on Robyn Beale on August 2, 2021. (ABC Tropical North: Liam O’Connell)<\/p>\n

However, the coroner heard her Beale’s condition “suddenly deteriorated” and she told a nurse she could not breathe at 2:25am the following morning.<\/p>\n

The coroner found the medical officer on duty, Adam Hatherly, and nursing staff “did not do what was necessary” to manage Ms Beale’s bleeding, despite having been trained to treat patients after thyroid removal operations.<\/p>\n

Magistrate Lee found that between the time of the deterioration and Dr Fitzgerald returning to the hospital, Dr Hatherley “took on the leadership role in the early resuscitation efforts”.<\/p>\n

She identified “systemic shortcomings” in after-hours cover at MPHM that forced Dr Hatherly to operate beyond “his then-skill set, training, qualifications and experience”.<\/p>\n

Surgeon recalls harrowing night before patient’s death<\/a><\/p>\n

A Mackay-based surgeon tells a coronial inquest nurses waited close to an hour to call him after a grandmother said she could not breathe.<\/p>\n

Magistrate Lee also found it was “inappropriate” for Ms Beale to be cared for by an endorsed enrolled nurse (EEN) instead of a more senior registered nurse (RN) overnight “regardless of the rarity of the bleeding complication”.<\/p>\n

She said even if the staff had been capable of immediately treating the bleeding, Ms Beale’s pupils became fixed and dilated very shortly after the bleeding began, indicating brain death.<\/p>\n

The coroner found Dr Fitzgerald’s management of the bleeding was “adequate and appropriate” once he arrived back at the hospital at about 2.50am.<\/p>\n

Improvements made<\/p>\n

The coroner recommended the hospital take steps to ensure medical practitioners working overnight had the competency and confidence to perform advanced airway management, particularly intubation.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Mater Private Hospital Mackay has operated since 1927 and moved to its present location in 2003. (ABC News: Mark Leonardi)<\/p>\n

Representatives for MPHM gave evidence about changes made following Ms Beale’s death.<\/p>\n

These included scheduling hemithyroidectomy surgeries in the morning to allow for complications to be managed in the afternoon when the hospital was fully staffed.<\/p>\n

Three anaesthetists were also on call at all hours, and the responsibilities of EENs and RNs were better understood and defined.<\/p>\n

Magistrate Lee said the hospital had been “transparent about its shortcomings” and that “substantial changes” had been made since Ms Beale’s death.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A coroner has found a 78-year-old woman who died at a private hospital in Queensland did not receive…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":576052,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[64,63,99,69779,282560,282557,15791,282556,282559,69776,282558],"class_list":["post-576051","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-business","tag-coroner-carol-lee","tag-dr-adam-hatherly","tag-dr-william-fitzgerald","tag-mater","tag-mater-private-hospital-mackay","tag-queensland-coroner","tag-robyn-beale","tag-thyroid-surgery"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/576051","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=576051"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/576051\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/576052"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=576051"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=576051"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=576051"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}