Student would not have died if he had been seen face-to-face by GP, family says

Mature student and musician David Nash, 26, had four remote consultations with doctors and nurses at a Leeds GP practice over a 19-day period before he died on November 4 2020.

None of the clinicians spotted that he had developed mastoiditis in his ear which caused a brain abscess, sparking meningitis, his family have said.

David’s parents, Andrew and Anne, want to find out for sure whether the mastoiditis would have been spotted and easily treated with antibiotics if their son had undergone a face-to-face examination at his first appointment at the Burley Park Medical Centre on October 14, 2020.

Mr and Mrs Nash, from Nantwich, Cheshire, believe subsequent phone consultations were further missed opportunities to diagnose their son’s life-threatening condition.

They said that when David deteriorated dramatically on November 2, he and his partner, Ellie, had five “shambolic” calls with the NHS 111 system – including one which categorised his presentation as “dental” – culminating in him being taken to St James’s Hospital, in Leeds, by ambulance.

Once at the Emergency Department, they said, he was left alone, despite being in a confused and serious state, and fell, causing an injury to his head.

David died two days later despite valiant efforts to save him by neurosurgeons at Leeds General Infirmary.

Airline pilot Andrew Nash, 56, told the PA news agency: “The mastoiditis is readily treatable with modern antibiotics and it should never have been left to get to the stage where it caused the complication of a brain abscess.

“He should never had gone to A&E in that condition. It is something that should have been sorted out way before then and, having approached his GP practice on four occasions, not to see him I think is the primary reason that they failed to recognise his condition and treat it.”