Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust

3. Mrs I complains staff at Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust did not provide her father-in-law, Mr I, with the care he needed following an operation on 31 January 2025. She says this led to his death on 6 February 2025. Specifically, she complains staff: • did not provide him with high dependency unit care • took four days to spot an infection • did not provide an NG tube • did not diagnose the cause of infection via CT scan • did not accurately document his symptoms.

4. She complains staff did not give Mr I dignity in death as they sent his body to the funeral home with his abdomen still open, tubes in place and his organs in a bag. She also complains the Trust did not carry out a serious incident investigation into his death.

5. Mrs I considers her father-in-law’s death was preventable. She considers failings in care contributed to the decline in his health. She says the Trust’s actions caused the family distress.

6. In bringing her complaint to us Mrs I would like the Trust to acknowledge what went wrong and pay her mother-in-law a significant financial sum.

9. The Act says we cannot investigate a complaint where a person has, or had, the option to take legal action. This is unless we consider this is (or was) unreasonable in the circumstances.

10. We consider Mrs I or her family may be able to take legal action. This is because the family consider the Trust’s actions caused Mr I suffering and led to his death. They may be able to pursue this via a clinical negligence claim.

11. Mrs I and her family are seeking a financial remedy and want to take legal action. Whilst we may recommend a financial payment if we were to uphold the complaint, the family may be able to achieve a higher amount if any legal action they take is successful.

12. We spoke to Mrs I to understand her complaint, the impact she says the family has faced because of their experiences and whether legal action would be reasonable for them to pursue. During our call Mrs I said the family are open to seeking legal action and are in contact with a solicitor.

13. During our discussion, Mrs I did not make us aware of any surrounding circumstances which lead us to consider it unreasonable to pursue a legal route. She understands Mr I’s wife may need to be the one that pursues a legal claim, and she is happy to support her with this.

14. We consider it is reasonable for Mrs I and her family to explore legal action before she asks us to consider her concerns about her father-in-law’s care. If they are unsuccessful or legal action cannot achieve their desired outcome, she can bring her complaint back to us. We cannot look at concerns a court has already examined, but we can consider if there is anything remaining we can look at, and if there are any other outcomes we may be able to achieve for her.

15. We do not consider Mrs I has a possible cause of action for her concerns around record keeping, dignity in death or the lack of serious incident investigation. These issues are closely linked to the family’s main concern about Mr I’s care. It would not be appropriate for us to consider looking at these aspects in isolation. We would not be able to achieve the outcome Mrs I wants by solely looking at these parts of her complaint. This is because Mrs I says her main concern is her father-in-law’s care and her concern that this resulted in his sad death.

16. If she wants to bring her complaint back to us, she should do so as soon as she can. This is because complainants must come to us within 12 months from the date they were aware they had reason to complain. We do have some discretion when applying our time limit but there must be good reason for us to put this to one side.

17. We thank Mrs I for bringing her complaint to us. We hope the contents of this statement explain why we cannot look at it now.

1. We have carefully considered Mrs I’s complaint about Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust. We are sorry to hear of her father-in-law’s death and the significant impact this loss has had and continues to have for her family.

2. In speaking to Mrs I, we consider Mrs I and her family could explore taking legal action on her complaint, and it is reasonable for them to do so. We have explained the reasons for this within the following statement.