The husband and children of an 82-year-old woman residing in Naples, who died in the hospital in 2015, obtained from the Civil Court a compensation of almost 210 thousand euros, but they still decided to appeal to ask the judges for “the ascertainment of the concurrent responsibility of the Campania Region”. The incident dates back to the morning of March 23, 2015, when the elderly woman - wife and mother of three children - was forced to call 118 due to severe pain caused by a suspected fracture (later confirmed in the emergency room) caused by a fall at home.
The ambulance - according to the documentation presented to the judge arrived at the woman's house many hours after the calls, without a doctor and without resuscitation equipment - transferred the 82-year-old to a hospital in Naples where the health workers found a series of serious fractures and then also lung problems. These very issues prompted doctors to admit her to the emergency surgery department and then transfer her to resuscitation. There, however, shortly after 8 PM, the woman died.
The civil trial on the responsibilities of this death ended with the conviction of the hospital where the 82-year-old was transported but, in the opinion of the victim's relatives and their lawyers Alessandro Milo and Amedeo Di Pietro, the Campania Region would also be guilty «as the holder of the national health service on the regional territory, of the qualitative level of the service, as well as in particular of the management and organization of the 118 service» which, they argue, would have rescued the woman with noticeable delay contributing to her subsequent death.