Trust told to pay more than £200k over dementia patient’s death

A hospital trust has been told to pay almost a quarter of a million pounds after pleading guilty to failing to provide safe care to a patient with advanced dementia who fatally injured himself. 

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) brought the prosecution against University Hospitals of Derby and Burton Foundation Trust after an incident in July 2019, when a patient died after absconding from the hospital.

Peter Mullis – who had advanced dementia – was admitted to Queen’s Hospital Burton emergency department and absconded twice. When he tried to a third time, he was followed by trust staff.

The CQC described how, despite being followed, Mr Mullis was able to climb over a barrier, fall down a grass bank and hit his head on concrete at the bottom. He was airlifted to the local trauma centre, but died of multiple traumatic injuries.

The CQC said UHDB did not take “reasonable steps” to ensure safe care was provided and that failure exposed Mr Mullis to “significant risk of avoidable harm”.