A grandmother from England died four days after having gastric band surgery, the Daily Mail reported.
Marilyn Wardrop, 54, weighed 336 pounds. She was told the procedure, which took place at Thornbury Hospital in Sheffield, England, would help her lose half her weight in two years. During the procedure, a silicone band is tightened around the upper part of the stomach, which makes the patient feel fuller faster.
Wardrop had the operation on Sept. 17 and was given a blood transfusion the next day after tests indicated she suffered internal bleeding. On Sept. 19, Wardrop was allowed to go home, despite complaining of some pain.
Two days later, Wardrop was still feeling pain and called an ambulance to take her to the hospital, according to an inquest into her death held this week. She died in the ambulance of internal bleeding. The coroner said there were two liters of blood in Wardrop’s abdominal cavity, but he did not know where the blood came from.
The coroner ruled Wardrop’s death was accidental.
Her family is considering legal action against the hospital, saying she was let out of the hospital too soon. The surgeon who completed Wardrop’s procedure, Roger Ackroyd, told the inquest he performed 1,500 similar procedures and of those, only seven patients had died.
“She had been a big woman for most of her life and it started getting her down,” Amber Rutter, Wardrop’s daughter told the inquest. “She couldn’t play with her grandchildren like she wanted to.”
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