ELEVEN vulnerable mental health patients in north Hampshire died as a result of unexpected incidents last year, The Gazette can reveal.

A Freedom of Information Act request to Hampshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust, which runs mental health services, shows a rising number of deaths over the last three years. Many of the patients are thought to have died at their own hands.

One of the patients who died was Kevin Sewry, 38, from Bernstein Road, Brighton Hill, Basingstoke, who set fire to himself with petrol in a wooded area at the back of Basingstoke hospital in July last year.

North East Hampshire Coroner Andrew Bradley recorded a verdict of suicide after hearing Mr Sewry had a history of mental illness and self-harm.

Mr Sewry’s death was one of 11 serious untoward incidents' (SUIs) that were the subject of the Freedom of Information request.

Mental health charity MIND said Hampshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust had a duty of care to make sure all the mentally-ill patients were safe.

Alison Cobb, MIND senior policy and campaigns officer, said: “When things do go wrong, it is crucial that trusts assess the circumstances that lead to people coming to harm or taking their own lives, so that they can put any changes in place necessary that will help prevent incidents like these happening again.”

SUIs are compiled to record when patients under the trust’s care are exposed to harm grave enough to warrant an independent investigation. Overall, there were 15 SUIs in North Hampshire in 2009 – six more than in each of the previous two years.

Precise incident details are limited because the trust says it has a duty to protect patient confidentiality. But the information provided included one person setting themselves on fire in Parklands hospital grounds, one throwing themselves off a sea cliff, another off a railway bridge and one drowning in a river.

The National Patient Safety Agency, which monitors the NHS’ safety record, last year found that the trust had higher than average self-harming behaviour reported across Hampshire.

Dr Huw Stone, medical director for Hampshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust, told The Gazette that all the SUIs were taken seriously and investigated independently.

He said: “The purpose of these investigations is to establish whether there are any lessons to be learned for our services.

“Any actions identified as being necessary are monitored by a group of senior clinicians and managers in the trust, who meet every two months to ensure these actions are followed up.”

However, he said no conclusions have been drawn about the rise in SUIs last year because the increase of six was statistically insignificant because of the low numbers.

Referring to the instances of self-harm in the community, Dr Stone said it was difficult for community mental health teams to judge when someone was at risk.

He said: “The factors that drive someone to suicide are actually quite complex. It is not always clear which factors are within the control of the mental health services – the triggers that set them off may be because of a personal problem.”

He also questioned the patient safety findings about self-harming behaviour, claiming that trusts did not have the same reporting record.