Baby died after being fed a day's food in just an hour via a drip at scandal-hit children's hospital

A baby has died at the scandal hit Bristol Children's Hospital after being fed a day's food in one hour. Seven-day-old Maisie Bennett was being fed intravenously because she was born with a congenital heart defect.  But the baby's feeding machine was wrongly programmed, leading to her suffering cardiac arrest hours later.

 

Tragedy: The baby girl died after being overfed when her feeding machine was wrongly programmed and suffered a cardiac arrest

Maisie, who was born by a planned Caesarean section on 16 August 2011 with an atrioventricular septal defect, meaning the walls in her heart were missing, was given 28 times the 7.5ml of formula she should have had. An inquest heard a nurse mistakenly entered the daily dose of 210ml under the hourly rate, and the baby died on August 22. Her parents, Laura Bennett and Ryan Waters of Ebbw Vale, Blaenau Gwent, have spoken about their heartbreak.

Ms Bennett said that a doctor had tried to revive her daughter for 45 minutes before he told her there was nothing else they could do, the Sunday Express reports. She said: 'I was numb, it was like I wasn't there and looking in on someone else's life. 'They asked if we wanted to be there when she passed away, but I couldn’t watch her die.' She and Mr Bennett then went to say goodbye to their baby daughter, and nurses handed the couple a memory box containing a lock of Maisie's hair.

 

Scandal care: This is not the first time Bristol Children's Hospital has been accused of maltreatment - at least 35 babies died in the 80s and 90s which may have been the result of mistakes

An inquest recorded a narrative verdict. The Bristol Children's Hospital was embroiled in scandal in the Eighties and Nineties when it was found that at least 35 babies died and scores may have been saved if they had not been operated on there. It has led to a national shake-up of the way in which children with congenital heart defects are operated on and cared for. A spokeswoman for the University Hospitals Bristol NHS Foundation Trust apologised. She said: 'Immediately following Maisie's death, the Trust conducted an indepth investigation to ensure human error like this cannot reoccur. 'All actions arising from these investigations have been completed or are ongoing.'

Source: Daily Mail UK 

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