A diabetic woman admitted to a Staffordshire hospital after a fall slipped into a coma and died after nurses failed to giver her vital insulin injections, an inquest heard.

Gillian Astbury, aged 66, of Mavis Road, Hednesford, near Cannock, was admitted to Stafford Hospital on April 1, 2007, with a broken arm and pelvis.

However on April 10 she was discovered slumped in her bed on the orthopaedic ward after a 36-hour gap between insulin injections.

She died in the early hours of April 11.

A jury, sitting at Stafford Council House, heard she died of suspected keto acidosis, a result of the missed insulin injections which should have been administered daily.

Giving evidence, Ron Street, her full time carer and close friend, said her bed on Ward seven where Mrs Astbury died, was out of sight of nurses and he had found her several times in dirty bed sheets after she contracted the C-Diff bug.

He told the court: “I would say the whole area looked like a lab where cultures could be grown, it was really that bad.

“There was no infection control at all. I had to plead with nurses to change Gill and I felt bad when they did change the bed linen because I could hear her screaming in pain.

“They didn’t seem to show any compassion.”

Another witness, Jeanette Coulson, who was a speciality manager on the trauma and orthopaedic wards at the time of rs Astbury’s death, said staff were stretched.

In a statement to police she said she felt levels were so low as to be putting the safety of patients in danger.

She also told the court she did not know Mrs Astbury was diabetic when she had tended to her on April 10 and that a standard lunch menu, and not a diabetic menu, had been used to order her lunch.

During her evidence she said she had asked a senior staff nurse to administer Mrs Astbury’s medication, which would have included an insulin injection, but that never happened.

Stafford Hospital was subject to a damning Healthcare Commission Report in 2009 in which standards of care at the hospital were blamed for the deaths of hundreds of people between 2005 and 2009.

A public inquiry into the scandal is due to start next month.