Health chiefs have apologised after a seriously-ill teenager was sent home from A&E with two paracetamol tablets.
Just two hours later Owen Abbot returned to Perth Royal Infirmary where tests revealed he was suffering the deadly disease meningitis.
The apprentice panel beater, who was 15 at the time, spent almost a week in a high-dependency unit where he hovered between life and death.
Following the medical blunder his family took their case to the Scottish Public Service Ombudsman, which has just upheld their complaint and ordered the hospital to review its emergency department procedures, as well as apologising to the family.
Owen began to feel unwell on a Friday afternoon after returning from school at Perth Academy.
He spent most of Saturday sleeping before his worried parents took him to PRI at 1am on Sunday December 9 2012.
Owen’s mum Nicola Stewart said: “Owen was dying and they sent him home. It’s absolutely despicable. He was ill for a couple of days but we didn’t think much of it. He came home from school on the Friday and said he had a headache and I told him to take ibuprofen.
“He woke us in the early hours of the morning on December 9 and he was talking rubbish he was very confused and said it felt like someone was putting a sledgehammer through his head. We thought something was really wrong so we took him to A&E.”
“The triage nurse made a passing comment that there was a lot of bugs going around and gave him two paracetamol without doing any observations whatsoever.”
An appointment was made for Owen to attend the out-of-hours GP service at 3am and he was sent home to wait.
“When we got him home his condition really got worse,” said Nicola. “He was delirious and started vomiting. Because of his headache he was rocking with his head in his hands it was awful to see.
“Meningitis never crossed our minds but when we saw the doctor he suspected it straight away.”
Own was immediately booked in for tests, which confirmed he had bacterial meningitis.
Nicola said: “At that point he was halfway gone already and they pumped him full of antibiotics, steroids and painkillers.
“He said to me ‘I can’t go on’ but I told him he had to, he had to fight it. He was telling us he loved us.
“He was in HDU for five days because he was so ill they couldn’t transfer him to Ninewells.
“I asked the consultant if Owen was going to die and he didn’t answer me he couldn’t answer me.”
Nicola said Owen, who is now 17, has suffered no serious consequences as a result of the incident but does have occasional memory and concentration lapses.
She said the experience was still “raw” and was reluctant to accept the apology. It’s just another apology letter it means nothing,” she said.
“It’s not good enough. I am angry at how we were treated it was absolutely awful.
“There’s a lot of deaths with meningitis and it can take just a few hours to kill. He could have collapsed or he could have gone to bed and never woken up. The GP saved his life.”
An NHS Tayside spokeswoman declined to comment on the individual case but said: “We have accepted and actioned all recommendations.”
Picture by Phil Hannah