in Greenhithe,<\/a> that morning.<\/p>\nClaire said: \u201cHe was walking on his way to the dining room for breakfast, and just all of a sudden, he just kind of went all stiff and fell forward, and he was breathing, but he was just unresponsive.<\/p>\n
![\"Ronald,](\"data:image\/svg+xml,%3Csvg)
Ronald, after being admitted to Darent Valley Hospital<\/p>\n
\u201cThey didn’t really know what had happened – they actually said they thought they were losing him. It really frightened them, so they called for an ambulance, and they rang me, so I went straight up there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Initially, doctors suspected Ronald had Sepsis and passed him on to the medical team. He was later moved to the Acute Medical Unit (AMU) after it was deemed he had an infection.<\/p>\n
He was discharged last Wednesday (October 22) morning.<\/p>\n
But when he got to the care home, his daughter said they rang her and said: \u201cClaire, your dad\u2019s back, are you aware of a ReSPECT form?\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cI said no, and they said, \u2018We didn’t think you would be\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n
A ReSPECT form, which sets out preferences around a patient\u2019s clinical care, is kept with them at all times.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s different to a DNR, also known as a “do not resuscitate” form, which is a legal medical document that instructs healthcare providers not to perform CPR if a person’s heart stops or they stop breathing.<\/p>\n
In Ronald\u2019s ReSpPECT form it is noted that he lacks the capacity to participate in the decisions of the form, and where applicable, clinical decisions have been made in consultation with family or friends.<\/p>\n
But Claire says a conversation was never had with her, and her name and signature are missing under the \u201cemergency contacts and those involved in discussing\u201d section on the form.<\/p>\n
The ReSPECT form says to \u201cavoid hospitalisation\u201d<\/p>\n
The 55-year-old said: \u201cI ran to the hospital and spoke to AMU, who said, according to their records, I had a conversation with a consultant on the 15th, who discussed with me about the effects of CPR and that together, we’d come to this conclusion.<\/p>\n
\u201cI told them I didn’t speak to a consultant, and they said, \u2018Well, that’s what’s on the system, and if you’re saying that’s not correct, you need to speak to PALS\u2019 [Patient Advice and Liaison Service].\u201d<\/p>\n
In a bid to rectify the problem, Claire spent all morning the following day trying to ring their line, only for all her calls to go to voicemail.<\/p>\n
She then went back to the hospital to visit the PALs office, but found it closed \u201cdue to unforeseen circumstances\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cI went back to the ward and said to them, \u2018I want you to put a note to say that until this is sorted, if my dad is poorly, he will be coming into hospital.<\/p>\n
Claire\u2019s 95-year-old dad, Ronald BrownClaire\u2019s name and signature is not on the ReSPECT form<\/p>\n
\u201cThe fact of the matter is, had the care home not thought something wasn\u2019t right, I would have been none the wiser.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat could have happened had I not found out about it? It could have been life-threatening.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just think it’s shocking. It’s shocking that I don’t know what’s happened.\u201d<\/p>\n
Claire has since had a meeting with a different consultant she had not met before over the mistake, who she says apologised and admitted he started filling in the form.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s understood another consultant then finished completing it without his knowledge and sent it home with her dad.<\/p>\n
They also denied any knowledge of notes on the system, claiming she had a conversation with a third consultant and agreed to the plan.<\/p>\n
Claire went to PALS to rectify the issue, only to find it was closed<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you’re a professional, why would you sign something that hadn’t been fully completed? I don’t believe a word of it,\u201d Claire added.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe then said, \u2018You can make a complaint if you want,\u2019 so I asked how because PALS is closed, and he said he didn\u2019t know.\u201d<\/p>\n
Claire has since had further meetings with a complaints manager, but is still waiting for answers.<\/p>\n
Her frustrations came just one year after staff at the same hospital were filling in a DNR form with him, unaware he had dementia, while she had left the room to get a drink.<\/p>\n
She was only made aware of what had happened when a visitor to a patient in bed next to Ronald\u2019s told her.<\/p>\n
The incident, which happened in early December 2024, was also reported to PALS at the time.<\/p>\n
Claire added: \u201cI just don’t trust them to look after him properly. Not all of them, some staff are amazing, and others, you can tell, really don’t want to be there.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know they’re under pressure and they need the beds and everything, but just too many mistakes are being made.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dartford and Gravesham NHS Trust, who run Darent Valley Hospital, were approached for comment.<\/p>\n
They did not respond to KentOnline\u2019s request at the time of publication.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A horrified daughter claims a hospital error resulted in staff wrongfully signing a medical form to not readmit…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":231593,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[3843,3862,102,2960,192,191,194,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-231592","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-dartford","9":"tag-gravesham","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-healthcare","12":"tag-human-interest","13":"tag-kent","14":"tag-syndicate","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom","17":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231592","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=231592"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231592\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/231593"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=231592"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=231592"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=231592"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}