Coroner says student might be alive if GP had seen him

A law student who died after four remote GP consultations might have lived had he been given a face-to-face appointment, a coroner ruled.

David Nash, 26, died in November 2020 from a bone infection behind his ear that caused an abscess on the brain.

Over a 19-day period leading up to his death, he had four phone consultations with his GP.

The coroner, Abigail Combes, said the failure to see him meant he underwent surgery ten hours later than it could have been.

Andrew and Anne Nash fought for more than two years to find out whether their son would have lived if he had been seen in person by clinical staff at Burley Park Medical Centre in Leeds.

Yesterday they said they were “both saddened and vindicated by the findings that the simple and obvious, necessary step of seeing him in person would have saved his life” and wanted to make sure “others don’t die as David did”.

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Source: The Times, 21 January 2023