A WOMAN in Colchester General Hospital’s critical care unit had to be driven more than 70 miles to another hospital – because medics decided her bed was needed by someone else.

Muriel Beardwell, 71, was taken to Colchester General Hospital after a fall at her home in Greenstead, Colchester. She ended up in critical care because she needed help breathing and underwent a tracheotomy to open her airway.

However, late on Wednesday, critical care doctors announced they were moving the sick pensioner two hours up the A12 to the James Paget Hospital in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk.

They decided Mrs Beardwell was the most suitable to be moved since she was the most stable of the 12 patients in the unit – to the horror of her son, Phil Beardwell, of Waterside Lane, Colchester.

He said: “They told us it was essential we keep visiting her to help her and keep up her morale, but now they’ve moved her to a hospital more than two hours away.

“It makes it virtually impossible for us to see our critically-ill mum."

The family has made an official complaint to the trust which runs the hospital.

FOR THE FULL STORY AND A RESPONSE FROM COLCHESTER GENERAL HOSPITAL, SEE TODAY'S GAZETTE