A Scots gran was left fighting for life in a diabetic coma after hospital staff failed to tell her she had been diagnosed with the condition.
Shakela McDuff was admitted to the Glasgow Royal Infirmary on December 24 after she began suffering chest pains and breathlessness at home.
The 54-year-old was diagnosed with heart failure and kept in for three weeks while staff ran a host of tests - including multiple finger pricks.
But she claims that no one told her or partner Stephen Gillies that she had been diagnosed with diabetes and was discharged on January 11.
Just weeks later, an ambulance was called to the gran-of-four’s home after Stephen was unable to wake her up.
She was rushed to the resuscitation ward at the hospital where they discovered her blood sugar levels had plummeted - leaving her in a coma.
Stephen, 51, a full-time carer, was told that the mum-of-one had entered into the early stages of multi-organ failure and was seriously ill.
Thankfully Shakela began to respond to glucose drips the following day and is now recovering at home.
The couple, from Glasgow, believe the second emergency admission could have been avoided if doctors had told them about Shakela’s Type 2 diagnosis.
She said: “On Christmas Eve, we were all packed and ready to head to my daughter’s in Hamilton.
“But I was really struggling to breathe and my chest was sore. I must’ve lost consciousness or something so Stephen called an ambulance, which I don’t remember.
“The next thing, I was in the Glasgow Royal Infirmary. There were no visitors allowed in the cardiology ward that I was in.
“They kept coming in and pricking my finger so I asked one of the nurses what they were doing that for. She asked if I was diabetic but I said no. And that was all. She just left.
“How can I be expected to manage my diabetes if I didn’t know I had it?”
Stephen told the Daily Record how he made a panicked call to NHS 24 after he found his partner of 15 years unresponsive in bed on January 31.
He said: “After she was allowed home the first time, a couple of weeks went by with her having good and bad days.
“But by the end of January, she just wasn’t herself. She had a constant headache and was really sleepy so I called the GP who came out for a home visit.
“He took her blood pressure and said it was ‘in her boots’ because it had dropped that low. We went to sleep early in the early hours of Sunday morning but later that day, I couldn’t get her to wake up.
“I thought she was just really tired, run down and she generally does sleep a lot when she’s unwell. I kept going in and checking on her but she was waking up.
“Eventually, I knew something wasn’t right so I called NHS 24 who put me straight through to the ambulance. When the paramedics arrived, the first thing they said was ‘insulin’ and gave her a dose of it.
“They set up a drip and were working on her for around 30 minutes but they couldn't get her to wake up. They took her to the Glasgow Royal where she was put into the resuscitation ward. I was put into a relative’s room.
“Every so often, someone would come in and explain what things they were doing. But there was still no mention that she was in a diabetic coma.
“They told me to go home and get some things for her while they moved her to a different ward.
“When I went back up she was on oxygen with a tube up her nose and on a glucose drip.
“She was still unconscious - you couldn’t get anything out of her. A young doctor came in and asked me if I knew what was going on.
“I said that I presumed it was her heart again but they told me it was kidney failure. I couldn’t understand what was causing that.
“She rhymed off that Shakela had kidney failure, COPD, the trouble with her heart and anaemia. Then she told me Shakela was diabetic. But we had never been told this before.
“To calm myself down, I went out for five minutes and straight away I called my step-daughter. That was the worst phone call I’ve ever had to make in my life.
“It was absolutely horrible. Then I called her brother and sister which was obviously just as bad. It was the worst hour or two of my life.”
Shakela was moved to the high dependency unit overnight while an anxious Stephen was forced to return home.
Thankfully, she regained consciousness the following day as she began to respond to the glucose drips.
Stephen continued: “In the space of just over four days, she went from being at death's door to being fit enough to go home. The difference in her since she has been out is amazing.
“Obviously now I’ve read up on diabetes, so I’ve been monitoring her sugar intake and I know exactly how much she can have.
“If I had known when she got out on the 11th of January, the second hospital admission would never have been required. Whereas we weren’t told and we could have lost her.
“I don’t know if I was more terrified or more angry at the fact that nobody told us.
“After she was discharged the second time, the nurse and doctor both had to search through her discharge papers and eventually they found one wee line that mentioned her blood glucose.
“It didn’t say diabetes. Just that there was medication for her blood sugar. I’m really glad I called for the ambulance when I did because if I’d left it any longer, I don’t know what could have happened.”
A health board spokesperson said: "NHSGGC is unable to discuss individual patients but we aim at all times to be clear in our communication with patients both during their stay and also when they are being discharged.
"We are sorry to hear that Ms McDuff has concerns about her care and treatment and we would be happy to meet with her to discuss her concerns in more detail."
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