Girl's unlawful killing after hospital errors 'shocking'

Ruth Szymankiewicz would have been celebrating her 18th birthday in a few weeks, her mother Kate said on Thursday

The case of a teenager who was unlawfully killed after she was able to self-harm at a mental health hospital is "shocking", a government spokesperson said.

Ruth Szymankiewicz had been observed by a worker on his first shift who let her slip away to her bedroom despite her needing constant supervision at Huntercombe Hospital, near Maidenhead, Berkshire, in February 2022.

The 14-year-old's parents opposed her moving to the failing hospital, two hours away from their home in Salisbury, Wiltshire.

"This is a shocking case and it is clear that care at the Huntercombe Hospital fell far below the standards we expect," the Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said.

Ruth was left unaccompanied in her bedroom for about 15 minutes, where she was later found unconscious. She died at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford two days later.

The hospital, which has since been shut down, was rated inadequate and then requires improvement in two inspections by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) in 2021.

More than half of the staff due to be working on Ruth's ward were absent when the inexperienced agency worker was drafted in to monitor her.

A jury found on Thursday that other factors that contributed to Ruth's death included insufficient staff training and that her care was "not suitable nor conducive" to helping her recovery.

Ruth loved nature and kept chickens at home, her parents told the inquest last week

Ruth's father Mark said on Thursday, following the jury's conclusion that she was unlawfully killed, that she had been "immersed in a highly chaotic environment".

He said she was "essentially caged" away from her passion of animals and nature on the "poorly trained, understaffed and unsafe" psychiatric intensive care unit (PICU).

Ruth's mother Kate said they share "ongoing serious concerns about the governance of Ruth's care and by extension the ongoing governance of other units throughout the country."

She said they "particularly question the role of the CQC", given that "despite all the warnings, nothing meaningfully changed at Huntercombe" before her daughter's death.

The government spokesperson said in a statement: "Our deepest sympathies are with Ruth's family and friends.

"Young people with mental health issues have not been getting the care they need where they need it," they added.

"We've instructed the NHS to prioritise increasing the availability of mental health beds, and we are investing £75m this year to reduce inappropriate out of area placements so that patients can receive care closer to home."

A CQC spokesperson said it "undertook a number of inspections" of the hospital after Ruth's death and "increased our monitoring" of the Active Care Group, which ran it.

Another inspection in which the hospital was found to be inadequate followed in December 2022. The Active Care Group stopped providing child and adolescent mental health services (CAHMS) there later.

"Although the site is no longer operational, we continue to monitor the safety and quality of services at the provider's other locations and across mental health services for children and young people," the CQC spokesperson added.

"Everyone deserves to receive high quality care and where we find that this is not the case we take action, including using our enforcement powers."