Lauren Simmons

When Lauren Simmons told a doctor she had been suffering from headaches, vomiting and neck pain for
seven months he should have known she was seriously ill.

Instead he refused to take basic blood tests believing the 17-yearold student merely had a virus.

A month later she died from a brain tumour.

Now a report by the Healthcare Commission into Lauren's death has revealed she was a victim of
alarming NHS blunders.

Despite her symptoms bearing all the hallmarks of someone with a brain tumour, a junior doctor at
Medway Maritime Hospital in Kent refused to test her blood or send her for a scan.

He also refused to seek a second opinion and wrote a note to her GP describing her condition as a
virus.

Incredibly, this note only arrived five months after Lauren's death.

A second failure came when an experienced consultant examined her. He also refused to take her
condition seriously and would not sanction the scan she needed urgently.

When she was admitted to hospital this second time after collapsing, she was often ignored because
the staffing levels were too low, the report said.

Last night her mother Jane - who worked at the same hospital as a midwife - condemned her
daughter's treatment.

'It makes it a lot harder now that I know that Lauren would probably have survived,' she
said.

'But I had to know the truth and I couldn't let the hospital go on treating people the way
it treated my daughter.

'I begged the doctor we saw to carry out some basic tests, but he refused. And when I asked him
to get another opinion he just turned his back and walked away.

'Lauren never complained or made a fuss and it seems the doctors took this to mean that she was
fine.'

From September 2004, Lauren, an aspiring graphic designer, began to suffer from headaches and
sickness.

At first it was thought it must be a bug, but when her symptoms did not go away, she went to see her
GP.

After several visits, her family doctor could not work out what the problem was.

On April 11 2005, her condition deteriorated and her mother took her to the Accident and Emergency
department at Medway Maritime Hospital.

After a three-and-a-half-hour wait, the A-level student was examined by a Dr Qureshi, a senior house
officer.

It is from this first examination that the catalogue of failures began.

In a report into the teenager's death, Susan Coswill, a Healthcare Commission case manager,
condemned Dr Qureshi's 'initial flawed diagnosis'.

She said his poor decision 'was compounded by not seeking a second opinion from senior staff
present at the time, and not undertaking further tests'.

Her report referred to a statement made by Andrew Mason, the hospital's associate medical
director, which said blood tests should have been taken and the patient should have been kept in
hospital for observation.

A month after this first visit, Lauren was readmitted after collapsing.

This time she was left in the care of consultant physician Dr Paul Kitchen, but despite her
worsening condition, he was in no hurry to order a brain scan, which would have detected the tumour.


This was finally sanctioned, but the 'request for Lauren's scan did not include any
priority category', the report said.

'There was a lack of urgency in treating and undertaking investigatal which occurred because of
the failure at early stages to recognise that her symptoms may have had a neurological basis,'
said Mrs Coswill.

On May 20 2005, the tumour haemorrhaged and she died shortly afterwards.

Last night Lauren's mother said: 'I don't want to sue the hospital and get money out
of this.

I just want the hospital to be named and shamed, so everyone knows what they have done to my girl.