Coroner condemns Jehovah’s Witness blood transfusion rules after follower’s hospital death
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The NSW Deputy State Coroner has found a Jehovah’s Witness bled to death in hospital after refusing blood in 2019.
He said instructions written by the organisation in America did not take into account when acceptable blood products were not available and “should not be used at all”.
The coroner made 14 recommendations, including that surgical teams read a patient’s clinical notes before operating.
A deputy state coroner has recommended Jehovah’s Witnesses stop relying on the organisation’s “misleading” blood-refusal guidance after a follower bled to death.
Heather Winchester, 75, died from complications after hysterectomy surgery at a NSW hospital in September 2019.
Mrs Winchester lost more than a litre of blood after the elective surgery at Maitland Hospital and was urgently transferred to Newcastle’s John Hunter Hospital.
The 75-year-old refused a blood transfusion on religious grounds.
Content retrieved from: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-02-26/jehovahs-witness-blood-transfusion-refusal-death-nsw-coroner/104983208.
