A paediatric nurse died from heart failure brought on by the shock of hearing her alarm clock ringing, an inquest was told yesterday. Lisa Browne, 27, collapsed in bed on Jan 10, 1998, and was found by her husband an hour later.
An inquest held at the time was inconclusive. But yesterday the Cheshire coroner, Nicholas Rheinberg, accepted that Mrs Browne had been suffering from a rare hereditary disorder called Long QT syndrome (LQT2). The condition affects the electrical system of the heart, which can cause sudden unexplained death in young people.
Mr Rheinberg's verdict of death by natural causes brought to a close an eight-year campaign by Mrs Browne's mother to discover the true cause of her death. Doreen Harley, 58, of Connah's Quay, north Wales, had always suspected LQT2 and campaigned for a second inquest. At its conclusion she said she now hoped that other sufferers of the syndrome could be saved in the future. She also called on the Government to provide heart screening for young people.
| Yup, the National Health Service will do that allright, just as soon as they learn to stay solvent. |
After Mrs Browne's death it was discovered that her father, Terry, 61, her sister Rachel, 33, and her nephews Jack, nine, and Adam, six, all had the condition. They have all received treatment and are living normal lives.
Mrs Harley said: "Long QT Syndrome has affected five members of our family over three generations, and we now know that an ECG test could well have saved Lisa's life."
Mrs Browne's husband Stuart, 38, from Ellesmere Port in Cheshire, told the inquest in Warrington that he found his wife dead in bed after she failed to wake up for work. He said he believed that his wife had set her alarm clock for 6am but it was not ringing when he woke up. Dr Elijah Behr, a cardiac expert, said that in his view the alarm clock shocked her to death. |