WOMAN'S DEATH AT TE KUITI

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22194, 10 September 1937, Page 9

WOMAN'S DEATH AT TE KUITI

EVIDENCE AT INQUEST “ERROR OF JUDGMENT IN NOT CALLING DOCTOR” (I>K£SS association telegham.) TE KUITI, September 9. “Mrs McGrath made an error of judgment in not calling in a doctor,” said the District Coroner, Mr R. M. Somerville, after hearing evidence concerning the death of Isabella Rose Liddell, known as Dolly Liddell, a single woman, aged 22, at Mrs Daisy Margaret McGrath’s home last Saturday morning. The finding was that Miss Liddell died from pneumonia, which followed a septic throat and bronchitis. On Saturday last, at 4 a.m., a doctor was called, and found that Miss Liddell had died about 10 minutes before from heart failure, after pneumonia. A neighbour, Mrs Carlyon, a doctor s widow, with 40 years’ nursing experience, said that when she saw Miss Liddell on the Thursday before her death she knew she was a dying girl. She remonstrated with Mrs McGrath, saving: “Dolly is in a terrible state, and I would not have the responsibility for 10 minutes without medical aid.” However, Mrs McGrath said Dolly was then getting better. Mrs McGrath, in evidence, said the girl had‘quinsy, which broke on August 26. After that she was much easier, and seemed to be slowly getting stronger, and she began toeat better. She ate a mash of vegetables the night before her death, and during the night took barley water. Asked by Constable Fraser why she did not call a doctor after Mrs Carlyon’s warning, witness said she wanted to do so, but Miss Liddell said she was all right.