Ex-nurse dies after thorn pricks her finger

May 1 2008 By Shirley Bartynek

A WELL-KNOWN Hamilton pensioner has died from blood poisoning after pricking her finger on a thorn.

Former district nurse Jean Brown passed away last Tuesday in Hairmyres Hospital from septicaemia.

The 78-year-old, who lived in Linden Lea, Burnbank, punctured her right index finger while pruning a flowering quince bush in her back garden.

Jean, a keen gardener, kept the Japonica bush well trimmed so that she could talk freely to her neighbours over the garden fence.

The thorn, however, pierced Jean’s gardening gloves and injured her finger. She had been treating the wound by herself for over a week  when neighbours John and Margaret Lambie noticed that her arm looked infected.

Jean contacted her daughter, Hazel, who rushed her straight to Hairmyres Hospital on April 20.

Hazel explained: “Mum was seen by a  doctor straight away as the infection had spread throughout her body and was then  admitted to the orthopedic ward.

“Doctors expressed concerns that they would have to operate on her hand to try and flush away the poisoning in her body.

“I left that evening and her last words were to me that she was `completely knackered, had no energy and felt terrible.’ This was unusual for mum because she was usually full of energy.

“By the next morning mum had been operated on but had been taken into intensive care. She now had complete renal failure and was on life support.

“She was heavily sedated and her blood was now being passed through a filter. But her blood actually clogged the machine and we had to make the decision to discontinue with this.

“Later that morning we had made the decision that the life support was to be switched off, she kept breathing by herself for a further 15 minutes but then she was gone. It was heartbreaking and such a shock that this could have happened.

“If anyone ever told me my mum would have died from pricking her finger on a thorn I would never have believed them.

“The chances of dying like this must be millions to one. I would have said mum would have lived to at least 100 years old, she was so fit and healthy.”

Friends and relatives have been shocked by her sudden death of a woman who they say was “an extremely active and healthy woman for her age”.

Jean, who lived in Hamilton all her life, started her nursing career as a registered nurse at Hairmyres Hospital, and was also a sick children’s nurse during the 1960s and 70s.

She then became a district nurse working in the Bellshill area for a number of years but took early retirement at the age of 55 to look after a sick family member.

Jean was a member of Hamilton West Church, Burnbank for many years and was involved in the church’s Thursday Club.

She was also very keen to get involved in charity work and would collect during Christian Aid week.

Neighbours say she cared about the environment and animals and was `a very loving person’.

She was married to Robert, who worked for many years in Philips Factory in Hamilton.

He passed away 20 years ago from septicaemia after contracting a chest infection, which led to pneumonia.

She is survived by her two children, Hazel and Robert, and her two grandchildren, Sophie and Christopher.

Hazel, who lives in Hamilton, works as a sessional tutor teaching in the community.

Robert, a pilot who lives in the Far East, works as a senior captain with British Airways.

Friends and relatives of Jean attended her funeral at Hamilton West Church on Tuesday followed by South Lanarkshire Crematorium.