Smoker’s clothes caught fire

Kathleen Sweeney (69), who suffered from schizophrenia for the past 30 years died of peritonitis bowel ischaemia and burns arising from the fire according to Coroner James Kitson.

She lived for a month after her clothes caught fire at a smoking area outside the home before she died.

The incident occurred on August 22 last year at Naroon House when the woman had gone outside to light a cigarette. What happened next is unclear but as she stood outside her clothing caught fire. There was no indication that the incident was deliberate.

The owner and manager of the home said that when she had heard a scream, she looked outside towards the smokers shelter and saw Ms Sweeney on fire from the waist up.

She described the scene as horrific and when she ran out she tried to get the burning blouse away from her face, sustaining burns herself in the process before helping her into a wheelchair until the emergency services arrived. A quarter of her body was burned by the flames.

The woman spent the next month in hospital but her condition deteriorated and her treatment - following an agreement with the family - was discontinued and she passed away on September 19, 2011.

Daughter Mandy Sweeney, 42, from Ballymena said that her mother had died in such horrific circumstances.

“Mummy did not have much of a life the whole way through... for it to end the way it did was quite horrific,” she said.

Ms Sweeney had been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia in 1971. As well as suffering from audible hallucination she had been prone to verbal outbursts.

She spent a short time working in a mill when she was younger but spent most of her life in care facilities including Hollywell mental hospital.

She smoked around 15 cigarettes per day and her cigarettes were rationed so she did not go through them all at once.

Psychiatric nurse Oran Keenan told the court, “People who have mental health issues are very reliant on what I call the ‘three C’s cigarettes, coke and coffee.’

He explained that carers are reluctant to deprive residents of these ‘small luxuries’ and unless there is an identified risk they would normally be allowed to carry lighters as well.

Since the incident the care home has installed a fire blanket and extinguisher in the smoking area and checked the use of lighters by two residents.