Posted 03/02/2015

A hospital has settled a claim against them after a young Spixworth man jumped to his death from the Castle Mall in Norwich.

The man, who was suffering from depression, had informed the trust that he had rigged a noose in his flat and intended to take his own life.  In response they offered him an appointment with a doctor a month later.

Matthew Dunham, aged 25, first contacted Norfolk and Suffolk NHS foundation trustin February 2013.  He was assessed as over the telephone and diagnosed as suffering from ‘severe low mood and mild anxiety’.

He was advised to attend stress control sessions at the Forum Trust in Norwich. But a month later he was talking about suicide.

In April that year Matthew attended an assessment with a mental health nurse. The nurse recorded that he had significant risk factors, including work related problems, money difficulties and significant social stressors.

Matthew disclosed that he felt suicidal at times and.  On the previous evening, he had set up a noose in his flat and stood in front of it for 20 minutes.

He was rated as 7/10 to take his own life.

So Matthew was referred to the FAST recovery team.But two weeks later FAST had still not contacted him. 

Instead, they held a meeting among themselves but not including Matthew, at which he was allocated a social worker.

He was then sent a letter on 2 May suggesting an appointment for 23 May, nearly two months after his previous face to face appointment with the nurse.

On 9 May, Matthew climbed onto the roof of the Castle Mall and threw himself off.  He was declared dead at the scene.

An inquest into Matthew’s death in September 2013 recorded a verdict of suicide whilst suffering from mental disorder and whilst in receipt of mental health services.  But the coroner, William Armstrong, made a number of recommendations to the Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust to improve what appear to have been systematic failings.

Matthew’s mother Donna was appalled by Matthew’s lack of treatment and took the case to law.  Her lawyer is Ben Ward, a medical negligence specialist with Ashtons Legal.

‘Matthew’s familyfeel passionately that the mental health service let Matthew down, Ben Ward explains.

‘The details of Matthew’s case reveal a hopelessly bureaucratic mental health service, which completely betrayed him.

‘It’s difficult to envisage what could possibly have gone through the minds of the FAST team in allocating a young man threatening suicide a meeting a month ahead.  I dread to think of the turmoil that Matthew was experiencing at the time.

‘Matthew was let down by those professionals whose job it was to protect him. It may be that the fatal flaws revealed by this case are due to lack of money and resources or it may be management structure.

‘Perhaps the management structure is poor because it lacks money.  Whatever the reason, on the evidence of this case and others in which my colleagues and I are involved, people will continue to suffer and to take their own lives.

‘In the past three years we have worked on more than 20 cases of psychiatric patients across East Anglia, in which patients have taken their own lives where it is felt they were let down by mental health services.’

After negotiations the hospital admitted a breach of duty regarding failings in communication between its teams and in failing to provide an appointment more urgently.

It accepts that these failures ‘materially contributed to the deceased taking his own life’.  A settlement in five figures has been agreed out of court.