Wrong bodies hospital part-loses mortuary status

The health board says it has put in safeguards against any further incidents, and is working with mortuary staff to “deliver continued improvements”

A hospital responsible for two mix-ups which saw bereaved families given the wrong bodies for cremation has been partially stripped of its mortuary recognition.

The incidents were at The Grange Hospital in Cwmbran, Torfaen and assessors found there were “ongoing risks and significant areas of concern”.

The UK’s national accreditation service has since partially suspended its official recognition of the hospital’s mortuary activities.

Aneurin Bevan University Health Board said it had put in safeguards against any further incidents, and is working with mortuary staff to “deliver continued improvements”.

The two separate incidents occurred at the hospital in November 2023, triggering an internal investigation, as well as inspections by the Human Tissue Authority (HTA), which licenses the health board’s post-mortem procedures.

The hospital also had an unannounced visit from the UK Accreditation Service (UKAS) in early April this year.

Assessors found “evidence of a lack of standardisation” in the procedures for patient release, five months after the two “serious” incidents.

Deceased patients arriving at the mortuary from the community had different identification tags and paperwork from those who arrived there from the hospital, and there was also “inconsistency” with information added into the mortuary register, they said.

UKAS also raised concerns about a “lack of security measures in place”, including CCTV coverage, and no list of personnel with access to the facility.

In total, seven “areas of improvement” were found and the partial suspension put in place, subject to review.

A health board spokesman for Aneurin Bevan University Health Board said the two “unprecedented” incidents at the mortuary “were found to have the same root cause”.

He said the board launched its own investigation, audited the department, introduced safeguards against repeat incidents and completed 17 of 19 recommendations made by its own investigators.

Reacting to the UKAS recommendations, he said UKAS was not a regulatory body, so accreditation was not mandatory to continue its services.

But he added that “enhanced CCTV is being implemented” and “all our mortuary sites are secure, with swipe card access in place”, with additional training being given to staff to ensure improvements were made.