Experts divided over fall woman's death

An elderly woman was found with a 5in gash across her scalp after falling from a hoist at a Black Country care home, an inquest heard.

Irene Evans, aged 91, was taken to Walsall Manor Hospital after the fall at Parklands Court Nursing Home in Bloxwich in January 2007 and had stitches to hold the wound together. Mrs Evans' daughter, Irene Webster, of Bloxwich, wept as she told a jury at the inquest: "The nurse said there were too many stitches to count. Her head got more and more bruised every day. All her face swelled up."

Mrs Evans suffered from dementia and could not move or talk, the jury sitting at Smethwick Council House heard.

Mrs Webster said: "She loved music, you could tell by expressions on her face. She responded to her grandchildren, not by speaking but by expressions. She used to try very very hard to talk."

Staff were using a new hoist to lift Mrs Evans due to her stiff limbs and the fact that a pressure sore had developed at the bottom of her spine, which staff at the Park Road home attributed to the large seams in the previous hoist.

The medical cause of death could not been established, the inquest heard.

Professor Helen Whitwell, a forensic consultant pathologist, said it was her view that death was due to the head injury, and she had found "areas of damage to the brain caused by the trauma".

But pathologist Dr Smita Deshpande, based at Walsall Manor Hospital, said the blow to her head may have contributed to death, but that if this was the case she would expect to see some internal bleeding and possibly fractures to her skull.

Dr Deshpande said part of Mrs Evans's brain was suffering a lack of blood supply, which could be for many different natural reasons, and that she could not say definitively that she died from the head trauma alone.

The hearing, before Black Country coroner Mr Robin Balmain, continues.