Melissa Zoglie died at the Royal Sussex County Hospital in Brighton a day after she went to A&E with “excruciating” abdominal pains.
She was discharged after hours of observation and tests and went home to Leahurst Court Road, Brighton, where she lived with her parents Antoinette Adjo and Franklin Zoglie and her brothers.
But it was found out the next day during emergency surgery that the 21-year-old’s stomach “had died” due to a gastric volvulus.
This is when the stomach twists, cutting off the blood supply to the organ.
The doctors who treated her did not suspect what was wrong because they said they had “never seen” a case of strangulated gastric volvulus in a person as young as Miss Zoglie and suspected she had an ulcer.
Read more: Family’s heartbreak over student’s shock death
The inquest at Woodvale in Brighton heard from Dr James Piper, senior clinical fellow in emergency medicine at the Royal Sussex County Hospital, who took over Miss Zoglie’s care at 10pm on April 17 when she went to A&E.
Dr Piper believed Miss Zoglie, a student at the University of Law, London, were she read international business management, was suffering with gastritis, when the stomach lining is inflamed, or from food poisoning.
When making his decision to discharge her just before 2am on April 18, Dr Piper said he was satisfied she was “fit for discharge”.
He said Miss Zoglie told him she was “feeling a little better” and turned down the offer of stronger pain medication “which in itself was reassuring”.
He said she was able to sit up and was sipping on water.
He therefore “did not have concerns” and she was sent home with lansoprazole, a medication for stomach ulcers.
Dr Piper said he did not feel she needed surgery or a CT scan.
“There was no medical indication to do one at the time,” he said.
The inquest was told by three doctors that gastric volvulus was “exceptionally rare in a woman of Melissa’s age”.
But on the morning of April 18, her pain worsened and Miss Zoglie attended Beaconsfield Medical Practice in Brighton.
The court heard from GP Oliver Maddison who saw her just before noon. He agreed with the hospital’s diagnosis of an ulcer and told Miss Zoglie to double her lansoprazole medication.
He said “nothing jumped out at him” from her blood results from the hospital or from his own observations but that she “looked uncomfortable”.
“I stand by my decision at the time,” he said. “My expectation was that it would improve.”
Dr Maddison said he had “never seen” gastric volvulus until this case.
When she returned home Miss Zoglie collapsed and was readmitted to hospital.
Before a CT scan could be carried out she went into cardiac arrest and CPR was started. It was then decided to do emergency surgery to “figure out what was going on”.
Mr Gnananandan Janakan, lower GI and major trauma consultant surgeon at the Royal Sussex, said performing surgery when CPR is being given to a patient is “extremely rare” but it was believed it was the only remaining option that would “save her life”.
“The stomach was completely dead,” said Mr Janakan.
He said this would “probably have occurred over 12 to six hours prior to her attendance” but the stomach may have been twisting and untwisting, intermittently slowing the blood flow to the stomach for a longer period.
“By the time of her attendance on the 18th there wouldn’t have been anything more we could have done,” he said.
He said before her second admission to hospital there was “nothing to think her condition was life threatening” or that she needed a CT scan or surgery at the time.
He said a CT scan would have shown whether the stomach was twisted but if surgeons had assessed her on April 17 they would “have come to the same conclusion and she would have been discharged”.
He said he had only seen five or six cases of gastric volvulus and these were all patients in their 70s, 80s and 90s.
Joanne Andrews, area coroner for West Sussex, Brighton and Hove, concluded the “much-loved daughter” died of natural causes.
Following the coroner’s conclusion, Miss Zoglie’s father Franklin said he believed his daughter’s death could have been avoided and that a conclusion of natural causes was “unbelievable”.
Source link
[Featured]
[Just In]
