Eating disorder services in England need urgent changes, says coroner

A coroner has called for urgent changes to eating disorder services nationwide after concluding that a 19 year old student with anorexia nervosa died because of gross and systemic NHS failures and neglect.

The assistant coroner for Cambridgeshire, Sean Horstead, said that Averil Hart’s death in December 2012 could have been avoided and was partly caused by neglect.

Hart, a creative writing student, started her first term at the University of East Anglia in September 2012. She had a three year history of anorexia and had been discharged from the eating disorder unit at Addenbrooke’s Hospital the previous month after an 11 month stay.

She was found collapsed in her room on 7 December and was taken to Norfolk and Norwich University …