Plea over Wolverhampton hospital records worker

Ann Higginson died from mesothelioma

An appeal has been made to former hospital colleagues of a grandmother who died from a cancer usually linked to asbestos exposure.

Ann Higginson, 77, worked in a "dusty" basement at the former Royal Hospital in Wolverhampton managing medical records in the 1990s, a law firm said.

Her husband is asking workmates to provide possible "information about her exposure to asbestos", it added.

The Royal Wolverhampton trust said it had not had correspondence from family.

Mrs Higginson, who died in June last year from mesothelioma, worked at the hospital from the mid to late 1990s to around the end of 2001, including at the Royal Hospital site after the hospital itself moved, Hodge Jones & Allen said.

Mesothelioma is a type of cancer that develops in the lining that covers the outer surface of some of the body's organs. "It's usually linked to asbestos exposure," an NHS website says.

Colleagues "reported how staff would return home covered in dust and how pipes were lagged with asbestos", the law firm said.

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Her husband, Peter, 82, now living in Shoreham, Sevenoaks, Kent, said "Ann would always come home covered in dust and had to brush it off her clothes."

He had instructed Hodge Jones & Allen to investigate her exposure to asbestos dust at work and to find out if more could have been done "to protect her from the lethal dust", the firm said.

A trust spokesperson said: "We haven't received any correspondence from Mrs Higginson's family, or any solicitors in relation to this case, and were not invited or involved in the inquest or investigation, and therefore not in a position to make any further comment."