A woman who underwent a successful operation to remove her stomach due to cancer died hours later following rare post-operative complications, an inquest heard yesterday.
Noreen Dempsey (59), of Oakview, Santry, Dublin, died at the Mater hospital on November 28th, 2006, after an operation for stomach cancer, Dublin City Coroner's Court heard.
An inquest into her death heard that that Mrs Dempsey, who had been diagnosed with cancer of the stomach and of the right lung, underwent a successful gastrectomy followed by an operation to insert a feeding mechanism - an oesophagojejunostomy - on November 28th.
However, she developed serious complications and died following a cardiac arrest.
An inquest into her death found that Mrs Dempsey died from the combined effects of blood in her pericardial cavity (a fluid-filled cavity around the heart) and of blood clots in her lungs, following a cancer-related operation.
Mrs Dempsey suffered a cardiac arrest and was pronounced dead at 10.45pm on November 28th, 2006.
The coroner, Dr Brian Farrell, said it was a very complicated case and although it was somewhat speculative, he believed that the blood clots in the lungs "may have precipitated the sequence of events" and put pressure on Mrs Dempsey's heart, which in turn caused the escape of blood into the pericardial cavity, putting further pressure on the heart and causing cardiac arrest.
Dr Farrell said he was satisfied that medical misadventure was not an issue and returned a verdict in accordance with the medical evidence.
Consultant surgeon at the Mater hospital Gerry McEntee told the court that he performed the two operations on Mrs Dempsey.
He told the court he was very happy with the procedure, as was the anaesthetist.
However, at 10pm that evening Mr McEntee received a call from the hospital to say that Mrs Dempsey's blood pressure had dropped.
Upon his arrival in hospital, he remarked on the evident congestion of Mrs Dempsey's upper body, with "clear demarcation between the top of the body and the bottom of the body".
Mr McEntee performed an emergency laparotomy on Mrs Dempsey later that night to rule out any abdominal bleeding, and although he discovered 500 millilitres of blood in her peritoneal cavity, Mr McEntee said this was consistent with recent surgery and he could not find any site of active bleeding.
Mrs Dempsey failed to improve.
"I was shocked. I couldn't explain her deterioration and thought she might have had a myocardial infarct [heart attack]," he told the court.