Family's shock at Essex hospital failings that led to mum-of-five's death

• Russell Hookey reports for ITV News Anglia

A grandmother has described her shock after hearing evidence of a hospital's failings that contributed to her daughter's death shortly after she gave birth.

Laura-Jane Seaman, 36, from Witham in Essex, died at Broomfield Hospital two days after giving birth to her fifth child in December 2022.

An inquest found that Ms Seaman's death was avoidable and contributed to by neglect.

Sarah Shead, Ms Seaman's mother, said she had originally praised hospital staff for trying to save her daughter, but that had "completely altered" following the three-week inquest.

"They weren't following their policy in their procedure and their training," said Ms Shead.

"Any mother having just given birth is at her most vulnerable point and she told them clearly, 'I have five babies at home, please help me.'"

Despite her daughter telling staff that she thought she was dying and begging for help, Ms Shead says they "didn't seem to be panicked".

"She was saying that her legs and her arms felt numb," she added

"Progressively she was starting to become more agitated, more scared, more worried, but the staff appeared to be very calm, they appeared to be reassuring Laura-Jane, they appeared to be doing everything I thought they should be doing."

But that was not the case, the inquest heard.

A coroner found that warning signs were being missed, including failing to recognise a loss of consciousness as a maternal collapse.

There was also a failure to escalate her care to more senior staff and follow correct procedure to record her observations.

If they had followed protocol, said Ms Shead, "they would have clearly seen that Laura-Jane's observations were declining, her heart rate was racing and her blood pressure was dropping dramatically".

Ms Seaman went into cardiac arrest as a result of major internal bleeding at 6.30am on 21 December.

She had four surgeries, involving multiple blood transfusions and died two days later on 23 December.

Following the inquest, Diane Sarkar, from Mid and South Essex NHS Foundation Trust, offered condolences to Ms Seaman's family, adding: "Her tragic death has affected us all at the trust greatly.

"Following investigations into the circumstances that led to her death, our focus has been on improving training in recognising the early signs of deterioration and escalation routes in our maternity services to prevent this from happening again.

"We thank the coroner for her detailed review and have listened carefully to her comments and the evidence heard at inquest, all of which will inform our efforts to continue to improve maternity services at the trust."

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