Woman Nearly Died Twice at Stafford Hospital

Stafford Hospital, which nearly claimed the life of Nicola Monte

By Ben Aulakh

A patient who nearly died twice from MRSA after being treated at Stafford Hospital has said she “somehow survived” the “many disasters” that befell her while being treated there.

Mrs Nicola Monte made the revelations while was giving evidence on Day 18 of the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust Public Inquiry at Stafford Borough Council.

The mother-of-two – who spent one eight month period in the hospital – told the inquiry that she was concerned about levels of hygiene from the time of her first admission in July 2004, when she was suffering from a bowel complaint.

Mrs Monte said she was concerned about cross-infection after claiming that various patients’ stool samples were left uncollected.

She said it was during this first admission that she contracted MRSA, C.difficile and e-coli.

Mrs Monte said: “The infection was just invading the whole of my body really.

“It was going into my bones, at one point the sepsis went to my brain and I ended up in intensive care again because of that situation.

After being discharged in August 2004, Mrs Monte, who was diagnosed as having Crohn’s disease, was readmitted shortly afterwards as an emergency following a bowel rupture.

Following an emergency operation to treat her condition she was found to have “full-blown” blood MRSA which had resulted in a large abscess on her back.

Mrs Monte Added, “Somehow I'd got through the many disasters, somehow I survived.”

Mrs Monte told the inquiry that she later rejected an apology from Martin Yeates, the then chief executive of the Mid Staffordshire Trust, who stood down from his post last year.

She said: “If that man wanted to apologise to me he could have come down on to the ward and apologised to me personally.

“I think ultimately for me, by hook or by crook, I was still alive and I needed to rebuild my life and try and move on from it.”


Photograph from www.barrystamp.co.uk