Shropshire patient 'discovered cancer was terminal from letter'
A patient at a Shropshire hospital was left to find out he had terminal cancer from a letter sent to his GP.
Doctors failed to give the patient, named only as David, the findings of a number of scans performed on him during his stay at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital.
Members of the Shrewsbury and Telford NHS Trust Board vowed to investigate the incident.
The man had died of cancer in May 2015 and following his death his wife had written to the trust with her concerns about the care he received during an earlier hospital stay. The letter was read out to the meeting held at the Severn Centre in Highley by the board's director of nursing and quality, Helen Jenkinson.
In the letter, David's wife said she wanted to write to the hospitals in the hope that it might ensure no future patients receive the same treatment. She said: "David had his left kidney removed on January 13, 2015. The consultant told us some cancerous cells had leaked into the surrounding tissue and referred him for chemotherapy."
The letter said that David began to deteriorate until his GP referred him to the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital the Thursday before the Easter bank holiday. The couple were told that he would be visited by doctors and would have an ultrasound and CT Scan.
The letter said: "On Tuesday a doctor met with David and said he was not sure why he was in hospital and that he would discharge him to be treated by the outpatient oncology units.
"When we opened our discharge letter that was addressed to our GP because we needed some information, it was a complete shock. The letter emphasised that the cancer had spread to his organs."
Dr Edwin Borman, medical director on the board, said he was "disappointed" to hear about the treatment the patient had received. "
