Maggots found on patient's face

A woman was shocked to find maggots crawling on her mother's face in a hospital's intensive care unit.

Nyree Ellison Anjos alerted staff at Gloucestershire Royal Hospital when she saw the larvae wriggling near a feeding tube attached to her mother's nose.

Christine Ellison died two days later, but the family is satisfied the maggot incident had no bearing.

The hospital has apologised to the family saying it was "an isolated and rare occurrence."

'Sincere apologies'

Mrs Ellison Anjos, from Robinswood in Gloucester, said the incident happened on a hot day in July.

"We saw there was a fly flying around there. Everybody was making it go away even the staff in the hospital," she said.

"The next day I went there and there was this yellow thing by her tube and I thought that didn't look right. She kept touching her nose and fiddling and we could see it was bothering her.

"I had a close look and could see little maggots moving in there."

The incident was incredibly rare and we took immediate steps to prevent it from happening again Gloucestershire Hospitals Foundation Trust

A statement from the Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust said: "We would like to offer our sincere apologies to the family of Mrs Ellison for any distress caused by this incident.

"We can confirm that a very small number of maggots, each the size of a pin-head, were found.

"The incident was incredibly rare and we took immediate steps to prevent it from happening again.

"We have always been commended for our high standards of cleanliness and hygiene and we take any incident such as this extremely seriously."