Sheila Thurlow died after being issued 1,000 times the intended level of morphine at North West Private Hospital in Brisbane

ABC NEWS (Australia)

A heartbroken Queensland family is searching for answers after they lost a wife and mother while undergoing treatment in a Brisbane Hospital. Shiela Thurlow was given 1,000 the intended dose of Morphine during a simple procedure.

Transcript

00:00A retirement village in Brisbane's north is where Sheila Thurlow and her husband Raymond

00:11had planned to live out their final years.

00:14Sheila only got the benefit of living here for 13 months before she passed.

00:19Since she passed, I have found it extremely difficult.

00:23This rose and that rose, we got them from Toowoomba.

00:27Sheila loved spending time in the rose garden, but a cancer diagnosis left her struggling

00:31with severe pain.

00:33Her doctor proposed inserting a pain pump in her spine to dispense medication.

00:38It was supposed to be a simple procedure.

00:42The 85-year-old was taken to North West Private Hospital for the procedure on a Saturday in

00:47June of 2022.

00:50I left the hospital thinking, well, this will all go along fairly soon, they won't want

00:56me sitting around here, so I'll come back later.

01:00After hours of silence, a doctor returned their call and told them something had gone

01:05terribly wrong.

01:06We were with Sheila, we were holding her hand, we were calling her, Sheila, darling, mum,

01:14squeeze my hand.

01:17There wasn't a great deal of response.

01:19The pain pump had been inserted without issue, but Sheila had been given 1,000 times the

01:25intended dose of morphine.

01:28It was enough to kill her.

01:30For the first 12 months, I just was a bit of a wreck.

01:39To think that you take your wife to hospital one day and she's dead the next.

01:43Sheila Furlow's autopsy report lists her cause of death as morphine toxicity.

01:48The ABC understands it was the first time that this particular procedure was performed

01:52at the hospital.

01:54But ABC has also seen the hospital's submission to the health ombudsman.

01:58It acknowledges miscommunication between staff and says nurses had not received training

02:03on the procedure, noting one had Googled it the night before.

02:08A spokesperson for Northwest Private Hospital said they are limited in their ability to

02:13respond due to privacy restrictions, with legal and coronial processes underway.

02:20The hospital said it's carried out open disclosure with the family and has implemented

02:25a range of immediate actions, including issuing a document about the safety lessons learned.

02:31Two years on, the family is still grappling with the loss.

02:35She would have wanted to say her final goodbyes to her husband, to her kids, but didn't get

02:44that choice because people who were paid big bucks to do a highly skilled job weren't

02:51able to.

02:53They want justice and are calling for a coronial inquest to be launched swiftly into her death.

02:58Whichever party or parties failed in their execution of their duty need to be held accountable.

03:10The Coroner's Court of Queensland said they hope to hold a pre-inquest conference before

03:14the end of the year.

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