Broken neck was missed for six months

A mother died in agony after doctors failed to detect she had broken her neck for six months.

Elizabeth Hodgkinson, 60, was left in constant pain and unable to walk after she snapped two vertebrae.

Despite repeated pleas for help, four GPs and a team of consultants failed to spot the mother of one's injury - and prescribed paracetamol to relieve the pain. By the time the fractures were spotted, it was too late to save her.

Mrs Hodgkinson had Wegener's Granulamatosis - which causes inflammation in blood vessels and kidney problems - and in December 2002 she attended Manchester Royal Infirmary for routine dialysis treatment.

Her widow Malcolm, 64, claimed the two vertebrae were snapped during the procedure and over the next four months she suffered worsening pain down her left side.

The couple complained to four doctors at the Waters Green Medical Centre in Macclesfield and consultants at the Manchester Royal Infirmary, but they did not spot the fractures.

Mrs Hodgkinson collapsed in March and was taken into hospital.

Two months after that doctors X-rayed her neck and spotted it was broken.

But her injuries were so severe that specialist neurosurgeons were unable to save her and she died in September.

At the inquest into her death, Cheshire Coroner Nicholas Rheinberg gave the causes of death as respiratory impairment, fracture of the spine and Wegener's Granulamatosis.

Recording a narrative verdict, he said: "The fracture which was not diagnosed until May 6 led to her subsequent death."