Mum of girl who died after series of failures at Kettering Hospital fears more lives being lost
Louise Longster is the mother of 13-year-old Chloe Longster who died in November 2022.
Last updated 25th Oct 2024
The mum of a teenage girl who died after a series of failures at Kettering General Hospital says she can see more lives being lost in similar circumstances.
Last week an inquest found Chloe Longster might have survived had she been treated for sepsis earlier.
Chloe Longster, from Market Harborough in Leicestershire, died from pneumonia and sepsis November 29th 2022.
She had been admitted to the Skylark Children's Ward the day before.
Louise Longster says the condition wasn't dealt with quickly enough:
"A theme that consistently came across through the inquest was that the condition is still not fully considered a critical emergency.
"Yes, it does worry me that something like this could happen again."
We now know that there were missed opportunities through the carrying out of screenings for sepsis.
Outcomes were ruled that there was 'neglect with clear red flags being missed’ by Kettering General Hospital.
In immense pain, Chloe eventually died after going into cardiac arrest following intubation in the intensive care unit.
Louise says lessons must be learnt, and that things need to change:
"I don't think there's a comparable case where a usually well and fit child with no underlying health conditions has been in hospital for 15 hours and then has a cardiac arrest."
Julie Hogg, the Group Chief Nurse for the University Hospitals of Northamptonshire, said:
“We offer our deepest condolences to Chloe’s family for their loss. We are sorry that we failed to offer Chloe the care she deserved - we should have done more.
“In the two years since Chloe died our teams have worked hard to make significant improvements, including our management of patients with sepsis and those who are not getting better.
“We have also increased our staffing levels and improved the way we communicate with our patients and their families. We realise there is still more to do but we are committed to ensuring that every patient receives the best care.”