Sailor died from internal bleeding after A&E sent him to minor care unit

The sister of a sailor who died a day after being sent home from hospital after falling ill on the Thames issued a warning today about the downgrading of London A&E departments.

Anna Bessant’s brother Guy, 45, was taken to Charing Cross hospital by paramedics alarmed at his “grossly abnormal” high blood pressure.

But an A&E nurse tasked with filtering out less serious cases wrongly sent him to the urgent care centre next door, where two GPs failed to realise he had suffered massive internal bleeding, and sent him home with medication for back pain.

West London coroner’s court heard Mr Bessant was found dead at home in Wandsworth by his sister the following day. He had suffered an aortic dissection — a tear in the main heart artery. In a narrative verdict, Coroner Chinyere Inyama said there had been an “erroneous referral” to the urgent care centre and “a series of system failings”.

Imperial College Healthcare NHS trust — which runs hospital in Hammersmith but not the urgent care centre, is at the centre of a row over the proposed downgrading of emergency care at Charing Cross. The A&E would lose its consultants and become an “emergency centre” run by GPs and emergency nurse practitioners.

Ms Bessant said: “If you are keeping an A&E you need to make sure it’s properly staffed with people who have the qualifications and experience to make sure the right decisions are made as to where patients are seen.” Mr Bessant, a chartered surveyor, belonged to London Corinthian Sailing Club.

The court heard he was taken to Charing Cross A&E on July 13, 2013. Paramedics Christina Campbell and Felicity Neale — who were praised in court — expressed disbelief when triage nurse Kiran Gohel told them to take Mr Bessant to the urgent care centre.

He was briefly checked by locum GP Dr Marios Kyriazis, before being seen by GP, Dr George Simons. Poor procedures in the hospital meant the GPs never saw Mr Bessant’s blood pressure reading, which paramedics had taken, the court heard. The GPs failed to realise it had halved in only 43 minutes.

Dr Simons said: “I remember him sitting in front of me, saying: ‘I’m fine now.’ When I heard what happened, I wanted to give up my job.”

Imperial said it now carries out a series of checks before referring an ambulance patient to the urgent care centre. This had saved the lives of two patients in the last year. It added: “We would like to offer our apologies that the standard of care Mr Bessant received fell below that which we strive to provide.”