Dominic Gifford, known to family and friends as Dom, died aged 39 on July 9, 2025, after suffering from advanced liver cancer.
An inquest into his death was held at Wiltshire and Swindon Coroner’s Court in Salisbury on Friday, March 20, heard by area coroner Grant Davies.
Mr Gifford lived in East Cowes, worked as a security officer and was a competitive bodybuilder.
In a statement read to the inquest, his partner, Natalie Mawudoku, said: “Dom was the love of my life, he had a big personality and a great sense of humour, and we shared many light-hearted memories.
“He was deeply loved by all the family, and he will always be missed. He showed real strength and resilience during his illness.”
Dominic Gifford, died aged 39 from liver cancer (Image: Natalie Mawudoku)
The inquest heard that Mr Gifford attended Salisbury District Hospital in September 2018 while he was working in the city.
He was told he had a bleed on the liver, and a ‘mass’ was found. The hospital needed to do an MRI scan to determine what exactly this ‘mass’ was.
Mr. Gifford was given an MRI appointment on October 16, 2018, and Salisbury Hospital says he would have been verbally told of this. They also said they sent two letters to the address he gave, one confirming the appointment and one confirming the change in time of the appointment. They also called his mobile to confirm, but got no answer.
Mr Gifford was living with his partner, Miss Mawudoku, and her mum at the time, and she said they never received any letters about an appointment.
When the appointment date came around, he did not attend and did not contact the hospital.
The inquest then heard from Dr Duncan Wood, who is a consultant clinical scientist at Salisbury District Hospital and also chaired a Serious Incident Inquiry (SII) panel that looked into Mr Gifford’s death.
Dominic Gifford, died aged 39 from liver cancer (Image: Natalie Mawudoku)
Dr Wood said: “Our standard operating procedure is that when a patient misses an appointment, the slot on our system goes blank and is then referred to the admin team to follow up and contact the patient to make a new appointment.
“However, the member of staff who oversaw this procedure, who had only been in the job six months, manually marked it down as ‘did not attend’, meaning it was then not followed up by the admin team.
“We missed quite a significant opportunity to deal with Dom’s condition, and for that I am sorry.”
In conclusion, coroner Mr Davies found that Mr Gifford’s death was natural.
He said: “I find that Dom’s death has to be a natural death as there is no evidence to show that the failings are directly linked to his death.
“Dom suffered a liver bleed in September 2018 and did not attend his MRI appointment, and his absence was incorrectly annotated by Salisbury District Hospital.
“He was then diagnosed with advanced stage 4 liver cancer in March 2022, after which he received a number of different types of care before he sadly died on July 9, 2025.”