Hospital says sorry for missing cancer

Withington Hospital has admitted the mistake

The family of a woman whose cancer was overlooked by doctors has received an apology from hospital bosses.

Brenda Warner, 69, from Manchester, had a massive abdominal tumour which was preventing her from swallowing properly.

However, doctors at Withington Hospital believed she was suffering from clinical depression, and placed her on a psychiatric ward.

I feel very angry at the hospital but that will never alter anything

Charles Warner

The cancer was only discovered seven weeks later after a scan - and when Brenda was only five days away from death.

Even if the tumour had been spotted earlier, it is very unlikely that she could have been saved, but her family are furious that they were given so little time to prepare for her death.

Her husband Charles said: "She couldn't eat, she couldn't swallow and they just said that it was all in her mind and me, as a lay man, believed they knew what they were doing.

"I feel very angry at the hospital but that will never alter anything. She should have had an x-ray when she was first admitted."

"I feel robbed"

He said he felt he had been "robbed" of his last weeks with his wife.

The hospital has now promised to revamp its systems to try to prevent a similar case.

In a statement, South Manchester University Hospitals NHS Trust, which runs Withington Hospital, admitted that there had been "clues" that the diagnosis had not been correct - although these clues were hard to spot.

"It is possible that this might have been identified earlier had there been better liaison arrangements in place between the clinical teams.

"We are extremely sorry that Mrs Warner's family was not given this opportunity and we have apologised to the family for this."

The trust promised to tighten procedures in future, including introducing a check-list of necessary examinations for all old-age and psychiatric patients.