Patients looking up Tameside General Hospital on Google were given a deathly surprise when searches returned a picture of the grim reaper outside the building.

Google has now stepped in to take down the image – which was revealed to anyone typing the name of the hospital into the search engine – after being alerted by the M.E.N.

The image had been created and uploaded to a blogging website carrying critical articles about death rates at Tameside General.

The haunting picture then managed to rise to the top of Google's ranking system for searches for the hospital – which is based on web traffic and the keywords used in image captions.

A Google spokeswoman admitted the automatically-generated image had been ‘inappropriate’ and confirmed it had now been removed from its image database.

She said: “The images you see in our information panel come from the web and are the same as the images you see in search results.

“In this particular case, we have now updated the panel with a more appropriate image.

“All of our panels include a link so you can tell us when we may have an inaccuracy in our information.”

Last month a two-day review of death rates at the hospital was carried out as part of the Keogh Review – which is looking at potential failings at 14 hospital trusts.

Between October 2011 and September 2012, 18 per cent more patients at Tameside died than would be expected at a similar hospital, according to statistics.

The investigation was launched following the Mid-Staffordshire Hospitals scandal, where hundreds of patients died needlessly due to poor care.

The results of the inspections, lead by government health chief Sir Bruce Keogh, will be made public later this year – although hospital managers will be informed immediately if anything of serious concern is found.

Tameside Hospital declined to comment.