The Belfast Health and Social Care Trust has been criticized by a watchdog for failing a young woman with a severe disability who subsequently died. Sofia Cerulli had complex needs that necessitated 24-hour care. However, the trust changed her long-term care package when she turned 18, resulting in a fall in the standard of her care and leading to a complaint made by Sofia’s mother, Vittoria, which was upheld by the Public Services Ombudsman. Margaret Kelly, the ombudsman, voiced her surprise that the trust dismantled a care package that had been working effectively for several years, and criticized the adult services team for not collaborating with the children’s team to establish a suitable ongoing standard of care for Sofia.
Ms. Kelly noted that “opportunities were lost for decision makers to build relationships with the service user and her family” and emphasized that the change to Sofia’s care package caused “the injustice of lost opportunity, distress and anxiety” for Sofia and her family before she died. She recommended that the Belfast Trust CEO apologize to Sofia’s mother, develop policies and procedures governing the transition between child and adult services, and remedy the “significant and unacceptable gap” with urgency.
The Belfast Trust apologized to Sofia’s family and also accepted and acknowledged the findings of the Nipso report. The trust spokesperson promised that it has been “working to ensure that our processes for transition from child to adult care are more robust” and added that it has appointed a specialist nurse to work with children aged 14 and above who are transitioning to adult services. Ms. Kelly’s findings demonstrated that Sofia and her family were let down in more ways than they had initially realized.
Vittoria indicated that some of the recommended changes could make a significant difference to families of children with complex needs. She stated that “it’s too late for Sofia, but that will be her legacy to those children,” and emphasized the necessity of the trust having “known how to provide the care.” Sofia’s fate may alert the public to the significant changes required in the area of healthcare planning for those transitioning from child to adult services with life-limiting conditions
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