Context
Dr Huw Mayberry, consultant paediatrician, gave Thirlwall Inquiry evidence on the 2015–16 cluster period, unit capacity issues and the consultants’ escalation sequence.
Key ground
Dr Mayberry, at the Countess from March to September 2016, described a chronic staffing shortfall on the paediatric rota — “3.5 working equivalent Registrars on an eight Registrar rota” — which made a shift “much more difficult and hectic than you would have had to do in another district general hospital”, and said Consultants were, at the time, “approaching HR and management” for more staff. His supervisor Dr Brearey told him informally, within his first couple of months, that “historically the Countess had had a low mortality rate” that had since risen, and that “they didn’t understand why it had gone up and that’s why they had sought external opinions and advice” — a Neonatal Network review, and later one from the Royal College.
In June 2016 Dr Mayberry examined Child O, one of a set of triplets, overnight after a nurse raised a concern about his abdomen; Child O deteriorated the following day, and Child P, another of the triplets, died shortly afterwards. He said he “felt devastated, shocked and bewildered” and that “Triplets are rare and I thought they must have had some sort of common genetic or gut problem”. Asked directly whether he had ever had suspicions or concerns about Letby, he said “No”, though a colleague later told him that “Dr Brearey had thought that Lucy Letby was a bit odd and that the fact that both the triplets had died was a bit odd”.