In the spring of 2024, two days after a complex heart operation in the Midlands, a man in his mid-70s unexpectedly worsened and died.
The hospital referred the death to the coroner’s service as a matter of unexplained protocol, and clinical negligence solicitor Anthony Searle was appointed by the man’s devastated family to represent them.
To try to get to the bottom of what was going on, Searle knew he would have to ask the surgeons some probing questions. So Searle was disappointed when the coroner rejected his request for an independent expert report.
