16th January 2025 – Fairweathers had the great privilege of being instructed by the late Mr Darren and his family.
Darren’s past medical history included spina bifida, hydrocephalus, type 2 diabetes and a urostomy (fitted at the age of 16). He also suffered from essential hypertension and had a cataract operated on in 2019.
Darren had no sensation in his lower body (from his belly button down), he could not manoeuvre himself independently and relied on others to help him sit up or turn.
Darren self-managed his blood glucose level monitoring and insulin administration 3 times a day.
In mid – 2005, he was admitted to hospital with a Kidney stone. Whilst in hospital he developed a sacral pressure sore. He was given the wrong type of mattress during his hospital stay despite Darren and his mum advising the hospital that a different mattress was required.
Darren had district nurses visit to treat the sore which was recorded as a category 4 sacrum ulcer. He was advised that it was a chronic wound that was unlikely to heal and there was no improvement in his condition which slowly worsened.
In 2016, Darren had to have an above knee amputation of his left leg due to a pressure sore on his toe becoming necrotic.
Darren continued to suffer from ever worsening care with no escalation to senior clinicians about his condition.
Eventually, by 2019, safeguarding issues regarding his care resulted in a flurry of activity and an independent investigation into his care resulted in several recommendations and admissions of fault. For Darren this was too little too late.
In April 2021 with the aid of his family Darren instructed Fairweathers to pursue an investigation into clinical negligence.
Specialist expert reports were commissioned which highlighted significant breaches over a 15-year period.
A letter of claim was sent to the University Hospitals Sussex NHS Foundation Trust and Sussex Community NHS Foundation Trust.
They commenced a lengthy investigation and a formal response was forthcoming in August 2024 within which it was admitted that there were failures in nursing care from December 2005 onwards which resulted in the subsequent deterioration of Darren’s already vulnerable skin and delays in ensuring healing of the areas concerned.Darren lived long enough, by just a few weeks, to see that admission but regrettably lost his battle with his complex health problems and died at the end of August 2024.
His family continued the action in his name and settled the claim at £50,000.00.
Darren’s suffering had mercifully been brought to end by his death and his family wished only to see a rapid resolution to the action.
Speaking of the claim. Mr Graham Balmforth, commented:- “Those individuals who are most at risk deserve the highest levels of protection and care. Despite the multiple problems in his life and health Darren remained cheerful and resilient to the end. He was an inspiration to all who knew him or had any contact with him. From all at Fairweathers it was a genuine privilege to have had him as a client”.
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