Brave mum moves Tory conference to tears after heartbreaking speech about son’s poor care and death from sepsis in 2014
Melissa Mead fought back her own tears as she told how son William's poor care fell below standard
A BRAVE young mum whose child died in A&E due to NHS blunders moved Tory delegates to tears yesterday as she spoke at party conference.
Speaking ahead of the Health Secretary's speech, Melissa Mead fought back her own tears as she told how son William's poor care fell below standard "forming a catastrophic chain of events" that led to his death from deadly sepsis in 2014.
Melissa told a packed conference hall how tot William had struggled with a chest infection and pneumonia in the weeks leading to his death.
These went undiagnosed and untreated despite multiple trips to the doctors and A&E.
She said: “We were told on every occasion that William's cough and associated symptoms were viral.
"Subsequently, in December 2014, William's symptoms deteriorated, and in one 24 hour period we visited the emergency doctor, we called 111 and also the out of hours doctor.
"The triage and outcome of each of these appointments was that William's condition was non-urgent."
But his condition had in fact deteriorated rapidly.
She told delegates: "Within a few short hours of a doctors visit, I woke to find that my son had passed away. He was just one."
Melissa was followed on the stage by James Titcombe who lost his baby boy Joshua in 2008 after he suffered pneumococcal septicaemia and a lung haemorrhage.
He said: “When Joshua died back in 2008 I was working as a project manager in the nuclear industry where mistakes and failure were regarded as vital opportunities to learn and improve.
"But the NHS I encountered at the time we lost Joshua felt like it was more interested in keeping bad news quiet than learning from what happened, more preoccupied with protecting its own institutions and staff than the families who depend on it."
During his speech Jeremy Hunt vowed to dismantle the "blame culture" within the NHS to allow healthcare professionals to learn from their mistakes.
He told conference that "closing ranks against families who want to know the truth about their loved ones has no place in the NHS".
He said: "I always offer these families apologies on behalf of the Government and the NHS but even as the words leave my lips, I know they aren't enough. They want actions not words."