Decision report 201204517

Summary

Mrs C complained that when she was admitted to hospital with a broken ankle, staff administered an unreasonable level of morphine, resulting in a severe reaction. She also complained that when she raised her concerns about this with the board, they failed to provide her with a sufficiently detailed response, and failed to respond within a reasonable timescale.

We investigated Mrs C's concerns, and sought independent advice from one of our medical advisers. Our adviser noted that Mrs C was given a fairly high dose of morphine, both orally and by injection, and suffered a subsequent reaction (opiate toxicity). However, we did not uphold this complaint as the adviser said that the levels prescribed were not unreasonable, given Mrs C's condition and the fact that she was about to undergo a plaster replacement on her ankle which would have resulted in an increase in pain.

We also reviewed the board's complaints correspondence and were satisfied that they provided a reasonable response to Mrs C's concerns. However, to the extent that there was at one stage a delay in responding to Mrs C's correspondence, we upheld this complaint, although we did not find it necessary to make any recommendation.