Ambulance told to wait before drug death - inquest

Emily Stokes, 17, died in June last year

A private ambulance crew was told to "wait" by hospital staff after transporting a teenager who had overdosed on drugs at an amusement park event, an inquest has heard.

Emily Stokes, 17, died in June after attending a gig at Dreamland in Margate, Kent. She was thought to have taken MDMA.

Two urgent care workers told an inquest into her death that they were unable to pre-alert the Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother Hospital about the teenager's worsening condition.

However, the triage nurse in charge of organising emergency admissions said she was not informed about her dangerously high heart rate during the initial handover attempt.

'It just broke me'

A single, private ambulance had been booked for the event, which was not crewed by fully qualified paramedics, the inquest was told.

Urgent care assistant Rachel Clifton said she had not been trained to deal with patients who had taken drugs.

Holding back tears, Ms Clifton told the inquest that it was the first event she had attended in a professional capacity.

"I was quite overwhelmed by everything that was going on. I wasn't expecting it to be as chaotic as it was. The whole situation, the thing with Emily, it just broke me," she said.

Dreamland is an amusement park which often hosts events

Ms Clifton added: "I didn't think the hospital recognised who we were when we came in."

"Even though we said we had come from Dreamland, it took them a while to realise we were significant."

Emergency department nurse Emma Swinton admitted she told Ms Clifton's colleague, "you're going to have to wait, I'm sorry."

Questioned about this by the coroner, Ms Swinton said: "If they had concerns then they should have expressed it to me.

"If not, if he [the colleague] felt I wasn't listening to him, he should have got another member of staff."

Ms Swinton said she would not have left a critically ill patient to wait, and realised how sick Emily was when she saw the teenager.

• 22 teens in suspected overdose at gig - report

A post-mortem examination listed Emily's cause of death as MDMA toxicity.

Tests found 5,500 micrograms of MDMA per litre of the teenager's blood.

The inquest heard how 300 micrograms per litre usually resulted in impaired driving, while 1,600 micrograms per litre has been fatal in other drug overdose cases.

On-call consultant Dr Andrew Mortimer told the inquest that Emily might have survived if she had been taken to the hospital around an hour earlier.