Man who died from brain haemorrhage was refused head scan

A MAN who died days after suffering a head injury at his farm waited five hours to be seen in hospital and then was refused a brain scan, an inquest heard yesterday

Derek Worrell, 65, of Killenure, Ballybrittas, Co Laois, died of a brain haemorrhage on April 10, 2003, seven days after suffering a severe head injury.

The inquest into his death opened at Dublin City Coroner’s Court yesterday but was adjourned after a legal representative for the family requested further documents.

Mr Worrell’s wife, Elizabeth, said an ambulance arrived an hour after the family called a doctor.

During the trip to Portlaoise Hospital, she said the trolley pitched forward in the back of the ambulance and that it took the paramedic all of his strength to try and hold it back.

Mr Worrell, who fell at 7.30pm on April 3, was first checked at 2.30am, the inquest heard. His wife said she asked in Portlaoise Hospital if a scan could be carried out in Tullamore Hospital but was told there was nobody to operate the scan machine until the following morning.

“I asked them can he be sent to Dublin and they said ‘No’,” Mrs Worrell said.

At around 9.30am, he was transferred to Tullamore, given a scan and immediately sent on to Beaumont Hospital in Dublin.

The inquest heard Mr Worrell, a father of five daughters and one son, fell in the yard of his home as he filled a fertiliser spreader, possibly as he was climbing into the cab of the tractor.

In evidence, Mr Worrell’s son, George, described how he went out to the yard, where his father complained of a pain in his shoulder but also had a patch of blood on the back of his head.

The pair went in to the kitchen and Mr Worrell then went to bed while the family called the doctor.

The inquest also heard Mr Worrell attended Tallaght Hospital on March 31 for a scheduled check-up in relation to an ongoing medical problem.

Mr Worrell also suffered a head injury two days before he was admitted to hospital when a beam attached to the spreader swung in the wind and struck him.

The inquest was adjourned until April 21.