“I’m in trouble”: Family complains against West Coast hospitals

Amy and her two children at Peter's grave.
Photo: Delivered

Peter* sent a message to his wife in Westport from his hospital bed in Greymouth at 8:20am on a Monday morning.

His text said, “I'm in trouble.”

Her daughter Amy* described what happened next.

“My mom called him and he answered and she said, 'What's going on?'” Amy said.

“And he said, 'I rang the bell, I think I'm having a stroke. Nobody came.'

“Mom could hear it ringing.

“They talked for 13 minutes and no one came in. As they talked, he started slurring his words and then she said she couldn't hear him at all.

“Just before, he said his arm had fallen off the bed, so he had suffered a stroke.

“Mom said, 'Wait there, I'll call the hospital and tell them to come and help you.'

“She called and said, 'He needs help, he rang the bell, he's having a stroke.'”

“They didn't go in there until 8:40 a.m. – that's 20 minutes – it took them 20 minutes to respond to the bell.

“Honestly, it might not have made much difference, but someone is calling for help.”

Amy and her family are convinced that Peter would still be alive if he had received the correct diagnosis and treatment in the past six weeks.

“We were in the hospital so many times and sent home again,” she said.

The family has filed a complaint with the Health and Disability Commissioner.

They decided to speak out after reading about the death last month of Filipino carpenter Leo Lozano, 51, who reportedly died in Westport's acute care unit (hospital).

Amy, a young mother with two small children, came The Westport News with pages full of handwritten notes. She went through them with dry eyes and determination. She spoke of her father in the present tense.

Amy said she first took her father to Buller Health on April 11. His legs were sore and he couldn't walk properly.

The diagnosis was leptospirosis – a bacterial infection transmitted from infected animals. Symptoms include fever, headache and aching limbs.

Peter, 66, was prescribed Panadol and an antibiotic and has also been taking aspirin to thin his blood since recovering from a stroke in 2018.

When they left the medical center, Amy insisted that he move in with her. (Her parents had amicably separated.)

Over the next six weeks, Peter's health steadily deteriorated. He felt dizzy and had pain in his hands, legs and feet. He could not get to the toilet without assistance.

In the early hours of April 22, he fell while trying to get out of bed. He felt dizzy, couldn't focus and had chest pains, Amy said.

“I freaked out and called an ambulance at one in the morning.”

Peter was admitted to Westport Hospital and then transferred to Te Nīkau Greymouth Hospital where he underwent a CT scan. His family were told the results were normal.

On 24 April, Te Nīkau sent him back to Westport Hospital. He called Amy to pick him up.

“He couldn't walk,” she said. “He called me and said, 'I'm sitting in the parking lot in a wheelchair.' I said, 'What are you doing out here?'

Peter replied, “They just pushed me out of there and told me I could go home.”

When his family came to pick him up, they had to lift him into the car.

“The doctor said he was 'still in pain, but he could go home,'” Amy said. “I was frustrated and very angry.”

On April 30, Peter was recalled by Buller Health for further blood tests. Again, the family had to lift him in and out of the car.

“I remember that day very well because I convinced my sister to come with me,” Amy said. “I asked for the latest blood test results and the nurse said they were all good.”

But Peter's hospital records indicate that multiple results should have been a red flag for someone who had suffered a stroke and developed a small brain aneurysm.

She said every time his blood pressure was taken, it was high.

Peter's health continued to deteriorate. He could barely walk on his swollen feet. “He described it as walking on barbed wire,” says Amy.

He had chest pain, headaches, pain in his legs and jaw, tingling in his feet and hands. His hands turned white.

On May 6, Amy called Buller Health to ask for help. She was told, “No doctors available, please do not come in,” and that she should call an ambulance if she needed one.

She continued to care for her father, a stoic man who didn't like fuss. Panadol didn't ease his pain. A friend gave him codeine, which helped.

“But I would wake up at night and moan, and then I would run inside,” Amy said. “I never saw my dad suffer, I never saw him cry or anything like that. He was in so much pain that we gave him heating pads – it was really ridiculous.”

He also developed a large rash on his side.

Amy and Peter were skeptical about the leptospirosis diagnosis and googled for a disease that matched his symptoms. “My dad and I spent days and nights Googling, trying to figure it out ourselves.”

On May 24, Peter was so ill that his family brought him back to Buller Health.

“My mom, my sister, my partner, we all literally had to carry him out of the house and drive him in,” Amy said.

Buller Health did further blood tests and confirmed vasculitis, she said. It's a rare disease in which blood vessels become inflamed, restricting blood flow and damaging organs and tissues. There is no cure, but the outlook is good with treatment with anti-inflammatory drugs.

Peter was told he needed to go to Te Nīkau, but there were no ambulances available there – he would have to find his own way there.

“I was really shocked,” Amy said.

The only family member who could take him that day was her brother, who worked long shifts. Peter had to wait seven hours at Westport Hospital. Amy said there was a bed available, but Peter only got a chair next to it.

Peter and his son arrived at Greymouth Hospital at 6pm. There were no beds available, Amy said.

“They made him wait until 11.30pm to get a bed. He was lying in the foyer – my brother had to bring him in in a wheelchair.”

Her brother filmed Peter talking to a doctor. The doctor said vasculitis was not confirmed, but Peter's medical records showed it was the case, Amy said.

“The doctor said, 'We don't know, we need to do more tests.'”

“Then they made him wait all weekend for tests. They said, 'There are no tests over the weekend.' I thought, 'What?'”

The following evening, she called her father from Westport. He told her that a nurse who had carried him to the bathroom had dropped him.

“He told us, 'She fucking dropped me. She dropped me on the floor and my knees hurt.'”

After that, he was afraid to ask for help getting out of bed, Amy said.

Her brothers spent most of the weekend with their father in the hospital.

The next evening, May 26, Amy spoke to Peter again.

“He sounded quite distant – he's a talkative man – he talks his heart out.”

He told her that he hadn't slept much and was feeling tired.

“I said, 'We'll talk to you tomorrow, we'll come visit you.' And my children said, 'Bye, Grandpa.' And I said, 'Love you, Dad.'

“It was the last time I spoke to him.”

Amy still can't understand how Peter managed to text her mother the next morning, even though he'd had a stroke and his fingers had been numb for weeks. He wrote a second time – to correct spelling mistakes in the first message.

By the time his family drove the 100km from Westport to Greymouth, Peter had already had a CT scan and been given a clot-dissolving drug that has a high success rate. Unfortunately, three percent of patients experience bleeding. Peter was one of them.

“I was in a huge shock,” Amy said. “He was in a coma and was having trouble breathing… Then they told us quite directly, 'He's in palliative care.'”

“We didn’t know what had happened, we didn’t know anything.”

She said staff refused to tell them more, citing patient rights.

“They said, 'You have to request the notes if you want to know what happened' …

“Now I know. I know half because they lost his notes. They sent us some notes, but they lost the rest. Where are those notes?”

The family wanted Peter to be transferred to Christchurch immediately, as was the case with his brother when he suffered a stroke several years ago.

“We said, 'We don't think the care here is up to standard, we're not happy with the way things are being run,'” Amy said. “They said, 'No, we're not going to do that.'”

The family sat at Peter's bedside until he died at 2:30 p.m. on May 29.

“I'm still in shock,” Amy said. “I still feel like he's about to walk through the door.”

Peter had just retired from his job as a building contractor. He had bought a motorbike and often drove to Nelson or Christchurch. He was so fit he could spend a whole day on his feet, chasing pigs, said Amy – the youngest of five children.

“My father deserves some justice. He was a healthy man – he never smoked or drank, he was a motorcyclist and a pig hunter.

“When he came to the hospital, he was treated as if he had been out of action for a long time…

“Our trust in the health care system has been shaken. We have lost a beloved father, grandfather, uncle and brother.”

She said people need to remember that medical staff are just normal people who can make mistakes.

Her father had told her: “When I feel better, I will take this to the newspaper.”

Health NZ West Coast declined to comment while an investigation by the Health and Disability Commissioner is underway.

*Not their real names.