Shocking moment NHS nurses braid each other's hair as young patient takes his own life
06.11.2023 - 10:25
/ dailyrecord.co.uk
A shocking new video has shown oblivious nurses styling each other's hair and scrolling on their mobiles phones while a struggling psychiatric patient prepared to take his own life just feet away.
Brendan McFarlane, 20, was admitted to The Harbour, a 154-bed mental health facility in Blackpool in October last year. An inquest has heard how the young man should have been under constant observation but died four days.
CCTV footage shows NHS nurses vaping as they neglect their duties and plait their hair. The video, which was captured while the young man was planning his suicide, was released as part of an inquest into his death.
As reported by LancsLive, he had been classified as Level 3 in terms of risk. Over the one-hour period before he was found unresponsive, the nurses watched him for less than three minutes.
The inquest was told Bren, as he was known to friends and family, had waited three weeks for a bed on a mental health unit to become available after a psychiatrist requested he urgently be moved to a "place of safety". When Bren, who had a history of self-harm and suicide attempts, was assessed by the psychiatrist at his home in Accrington the doctor deemed that he was a "risk to himself".
During the second day of the five day inquest into his death, jurors watched CCTV footage from inside Bren's room as well as the nurses' station room which has a window to allow for regular observations. Jurors were told although Bren's personal belongings had been recorded on his admission to The Harbour, he had managed to keep an item which was not logged.
For a period of 20 minutes, during which no observations of Bren were made, he used the item in his en-suite bathroom as he went on to take his own life. In the one-hour