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A mother died from an infected cat bite after she was misdiagnosed at A&E and sent home without any antibiotics, an inquest heard.

Former web designer Gabriele Kreichgauer, 61, “loved” cats and was bitten by a stray called Tiggy which she had looked after when it came into her garden, her daughter Amalie said.

She died two days after going to Newham General Hospital for treatment on January 21 last year.

The inquest at Southwark coroner’s court heard a junior doctor wrongly diagnosed Ms Kreichgauer as having cat scratch fever after using the hospital’s computer system to determine the appropriate treatment.

She was prescribed antibiotics but was discharged before receiving the medication, and died of sepsis on January 23 at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Woolwich.

In a report into the death, assistant coroner Philip Barlow said the medication would likely not have worked even if she had been given it, as Ms Kreichgauer had been wrongly diagnosed.

Amalie, 28, an artist from south-east London, said: “I think what makes me most angry is that she wasn’t even given the medication to treat the bite. Even if she had been given it, it wouldn’t have made a difference.

“The whole family is still struggling to come to terms with what happened.”

She added: “She used to care for [the cat] and look after him like he was one of her own. One day he bit her because he was scared. He had been abused. She had a huge compassion for animals and used to love all types of animals.”

In his report, the coroner said a doctor at Newham General Hospital used a computer system called Uptodate to help with diagnosis.

He said: “The correct diagnosis was ... an infected cat bite — the infective organism for this is different to the organism causing cat scratch fever, and the appropriate treatment is different. Even if she had been given antibiotics it is therefore likely that these would not have been effective.

“At the inquest the clinicians accepted that it would be helpful for there to be a warning on Uptodate pointing out the need to consider the possibility of infected cat bite, and the important difference between this and cat scratch fever.” The coroner recorded that Ms Kreichgauer, of Woolwich, “died of sepsis following an infected cat bite of the hand”.

Mr Barlow submitted a coroner’s report to Barts Health NHS Trust, which runs the hospital, asking bosses to seek changes to the Uptodate system.

Barts Health NHS Trust said in a statement: “We are sorry for the failings in the care we gave to Ms Kreichgauer.

“Having investigated the causes we have reviewed our processes and put systems in place to provide safe clinical care, as well as having contacted UpToDate - an approved medical resource database - to improve its indexing to encourage selection of the appropriate disorder.”

