Priory Healthcare fined £650,000 over investigation into death of mentally ill patient

Healthcare provider Priory Healthcare has been fined £650,000 for safety defects linked to the death of a patient who escaped from a psychiatric hospital after being hit by a train.

Personal trainer Matthew Cavey, 23, was able to leave Birmingham’s Woodbourne Priory Hospital after being subjected to several minutes of “inappropriate neglect” in September 2020, a coroner’s jury heard in 2022. handed down a judgment.

Priory Healthcare Limited was told at Birmingham Magistrates Court on Friday that it had failed to provide safe care and treatment and “as a result put Matthew Cavey and other service users at significant risk of avoidable harm”. Admitted breaching the Health and Social Care Act 2008 by ‘acting to the public’.

In a personal victim statement read out in court before sentencing, Mr Cavey’s father, Richard Cavey, said from his own experience that Priory Healthcare had not learned from its mistakes and was a “calculated, cruel and fundamentally… “It was a dangerous company,” he said.

“Matthew died needlessly and in the aftermath of that most devastating loss, Priory Healthcare has chosen to make our lives indescribably painful,” he said. Stated.

Describing his son as a sensitive, gentle and intelligent soul, Mr Caseby said his son’s ability to grieve was influenced by Priory Healthcare’s response to his death.

Mr Cavey also told the court that the company had been “dragged kicking and screaming” to face hard evidence of its deficiencies.

The 63-year-old added: “Matthew was diagnosed with a psychotic episode five days before his death.

“He had lost touch with reality.

“My own ability to grieve was affected by the fact that Priory Healthcare, which had a solemn legal duty to care for and keep Matthew safe, attempted to conceal the facts of his death and avoid responsibility for their grave failures. has been inhibited for years.”

Priory Healthcare, who was charged following an investigation into the death by the Care Quality Commission (CQC), pleaded guilty through its solicitor.

An inquest heard in April 2022 that Mr Cavey was able to climb over a 2.3m high courtyard fence to be discharged from the NHS-funded hospital.

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The University of Birmingham graduate should have been kept under constant supervision but was left alone, an inquest jury found, concluding his death was “caused by neglect”.

Mr Cavey, who lived in London, was initially detained under the Mental Health Act five days before his death after reports of a man running onto railway tracks near Oxford.

Opening the case against Priory Healthcare at a Magistrates Court hearing, CQC barrister James Marsland said three other patients had fled the ward before Mr Cavey’s death.

Marsland said: “(The ward) had a courtyard that service users could access. Part of the perimeter was a fence, the shortest of which was 2.3 meters high.

“Prosecutors allege that they failed to properly assess risk and failed to provide safe care and treatment.”

Responding to Rebecca Cresswell, chief executive of Priory Healthcare, who attended the court hearing, Paul Greaney KC said:

“It should be understood by the public that the company does not admit to the charges that it alleges it caused Mr. Cavey’s death.”

The defense pleaded guilty that the company had put service users at risk of avoidable harm by failing to adequately investigate three previous disappearances from the borough, all of which had crossed the same fence. He added that it didn’t happen because of the incident. .

No patients were injured in the first two of the three incidents in 2018, 2019 and 2020.

However, in the third incident on July 17, 2020, a male patient who visited a supermarket sustained a cut on his leg.

Mr Greaney told the court that at the time of the incident, “there were no industry standards or guidelines in place” regarding the minimum height of fences for outdoor spaces attached to the type of wards involved.

Mr Greaney said the fence had been doubled in height and anti-climb roller bars were installed as part of continued efforts to ensure patient safety, but lessons had been learned.

Sentencing District Judge Shamim Qureshi said dealing with patients detained under the Mental Health Act was an extremely difficult area for carers.

The judge also ordered the company to pay more than £43,000 in prosecution costs and said the company must care for patients who are “vulnerable and need protection from themselves”.

He said the company’s responsibility was significant and the risk of harm posed by the crime fell into the moderate category under the sentencing guidelines.

A Priory spokesperson said: “We would like to express our deepest regrets to Matthew’s family and apologize once again for the shortcomings in the care provided to him in 2020.”

“We take our responsibilities very seriously and have implemented all recommendations identified during the investigative process and inquest into Matthew’s death.

“This includes raising the height of Woodbourne Hospital courtyard fences to 3.2 metres. “While there is no national standard for fence heights in adult acute mental health services provided at Woodbourne; We are currently installing 3.2 meter fences at 15 properties in 24 wards.

“We co-operated fully and transparently with the CQC investigation, recognized the shortcomings in care and entered guilty pleas at the earliest opportunity.

“We have cared for more than 100,000 people over the past five years and have balanced the need to protect patient safety with the need for patients to receive the least restrictive care in a treatment environment that promotes recovery. We are continuing to work on taking it.”