A HOSPITAL worker who alleged that blood was “criminally” taken from a dead patient has dropped legal action after a judge said it was unlikely to succeed.

Anne Stares, 61, said at an employment tribunal that Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust bosses “fobbed off” her concerns.

But Judge Robert Salter said her claims – which the trust denied – had “little reasonable prospect of success”. She has agreed to enter mediation with her employers.

Mrs Stares, of Cowley, was a tissue co-ordinator at Oxford’s John Radcliffe Hospital, where she dealt with families of dead patients who wished to donate their bodies.

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A blood test was taken from a dead patient who had donated their body tissue for laboratory research in May 2013, she said at the preliminary hearing.

Mrs Stares had argued it is illegal to take blood from a dead person without the knowledge or consent of the next of kin.

She said: “I knew what had happened was wrong. I discovered that the information I had was very serious and that the people I gave that to should have taken it very seriously, and I felt very let down.

“All the time I thought the trust were looking into things and investigating things and I thought they were doing the right thing.

“It wasn’t until the summer that I realised that they weren’t and they were just dragging it out.

“I believe that a crime has been committed but I was just fobbed off. I felt persecuted for having spoken out.”

The Tissue Coordination service was closed last year and Mrs Stares claimed she was re-deployed as a “punishment posting.”

Mrs Stares – who made a public interest disclosure claim – went off work with work-related stress in December and is due to return this month.

Akua Reindorf, for the trust, said at the tribunal in Reading she had neither been suspended nor punished as a result of her allegations.

She said the trust strongly disputed her version of events and denied the blood was taken.

An investigation into the bullying allegations was not conclusive and some staff had accused Mrs Stares of bullying, she said.

The trust would not comment further.


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