£115,000 raised for children of couple who died of cancer

The children of a terminally ill couple who died of cancer within days of each other have said they are “overwhelmed” after more than £100,000 was raised for them.

The money flooded in after the children of Julie and Mike Bennet, from Wirral, released a photograph of their parents holding hands on their deathbeds.

The picture was taken hours before Mike Bennet died last Monday from a brain tumour. His wife, Julie, died on Saturday night at the same Merseyside hospice.

More than £115,000 had been raised on Monday morning for the couple’s three children – Oliver, 13, Hannah, 18, and Luke, 21 – by 5,370 members of the public on a JustGiving page set up to help them “continue to live at home and sustain their activities and studies”.

Donations flooded in after the children of Julie and Mike Bennet released a photograph of their parents holding hands on their deathbeds. Photograph: Family handout

In a statement, Luke Bennet said: “My brother, sister and I are overwhelmed by the enormous support and generosity we have received from so many friends and well-wishers.

“Mum has appreciated all the help from close friends in supporting the family over the last three years through difficult times and it would be a huge relief to her to know this support will continue.”

Mike Bennet was diagnosed with a brain tumour in 2013 and had been nursed at home by Julie and the children.

The 57-year-old was a self-employed cabinetmaker who had served his apprenticeship with Baldock’s Furniture Manufacturers in Liverpool.

Julie, 50, who was a primary schoolteacher at Somerville school in Wallasey, was diagnosed with liver and kidney cancer in May 2016.

Family friend Heather Heaton Gallagher described the couple as “the most supportive parents”. She said: “Facing a double terminal cancer diagnosis is beyond belief and as a community we are working hard to support the family so that they can stay together and ensure that they can continue their education as planned.

“The biggest challenge is that the family car, a Motorbility car has to be returned, meaning that the kids can’t get around to manage practical and personal activities.

“Julie and Mike have been the most supportive parents, encouraging their children’s interest in dance and acting from a very early age.

“All three children thrive on the stage and I know that Julie and Mike would not want this to stop their children from dancing and performing. To help them do this, we need to make them mobile again and help cover the costs that this brings.”

The fundraising page, set up only six days ago, raised more than £15,000 in the first 24 hours. A family friend, Sue Wright, said of Julie: “I told her the community would come together to help look after her kids – and she opened her eyes and smiled.”

£115,000 raised for children of couple who died of cancer

Overall health risks of contraceptive pill raised at inquest into DVT death of Petra Zele

A West Australian coroner has raised considerations about the chance posed by some oral contraceptives in an inquest into the death of a 28-12 months-old lady who collapsed with a blood clot at Fremantle hospital in 2010.

The coroner Sarah Linton discovered it was likely the pill, combined with an obvious genetic predisposition to deep vein thrombosis (DVT), put Petra Zele at increased chance of having the pulmonary embolism that killed her.

Zele died on 1 June 2010, four days right after collapsing in the hospital’s emergency department. She had been taking the contraceptive pill Yasmin given that the prior November.

The doctor who attended Zele when she 1st went to the emergency department of Fremantle hospital, on 9 May, did not know she was taking the pill.

In findings handed down this month, Linton said the box on Zele’s triage type listing any medications she was taking was marked “nil”, and neither the nurses who attended Zele nor the emergency department medical doctor exclusively asked her if she was on the contraceptive pill.

“Simply taking the oral contraceptive pill elevated the deceased’s chance of building venous thrombosis,” Linton explained.

Studies linking oral contraceptive pills containing drospirenone to a higher chance of DVT prompted the Therapeutic Products Administration to situation an advisory on 6 July 2011.

The only contraceptive pills containing drospirenone offered in Australia are Yasmin and Yaz.

The inquest heard that women taking Yasmin have been six.3 times a lot more likely to create a pulmonary embolism than girls not on any kind of medicine. Contraceptives using a distinct type of progesterone improved the threat of DVT by three.6 instances.

“For the ordinary youthful girl with no chance aspects other than becoming prescribed the oral contraceptive pill, that risk is usually deemed to be quite reduced,” Linton explained.

But for females like Zele, who took the contraceptive pill and had a genetic predisposition to DVT, the threat was 30 instances better.

Linton said the emergency department also appeared to have either misplaced or failed to appropriately label the transfer of an echocardiogram taken of Zele on 9 Might.

Alternatively Zele was diagnosed with muscle discomfort and offered some ibuprofen.

The notes of Dr Susan Hinsley, the emergency department doctor who noticed Zele on that day, said “No PE risks”. Hinsley advised the inquest that meant no pulmonary embolism hazards.

Hinsley has since been taken prior to the Australian Overall health Practitioner Regulation Company and found to have provided an “unsatisfactory specialist performance” in this situation, but no disciplinary action was taken.

On 27 May possibly Zele went to her GP complaining of chest pains and shortness of breath. The subsequent day her father drove her to Fremantle hospital soon after she suffered from chest pains so extreme she struggled to breathe. She collapsed on the way to hospital and was revived soon after 58 minutes of CPR, just before becoming transferred to the intensive care unit.

On 31 Could medical doctors declared her brain dead and the up coming day her ventilator was switched off, at her family’s request.

Linton said that had the proper diagnosis been manufactured when Zele 1st went to the hospital, she would not have collapsed 3 weeks later.

She advised all GPs must advise sufferers every time they filled a new script for the contraceptive pill that they ought to declare it when asked if they were taking any medicine or asked to supply a healthcare historical past.

Overall health risks of contraceptive pill raised at inquest into DVT death of Petra Zele