10:30pm Wednesday 20th January 2010
By Peter Magill
A WIDOWER has called for greater understanding of prescription drug addiction following the death of a mother-of-six in Rossendale.
Talented musician Eileen Quinn, of Waterfoot, had battled a dependency on diazepam and similar substances for more than 25 years, Burnley Coroner’s Court was told.
But her husband Anthony, from Brooklands, said he felt there was little recognition of her difficulties by the wider medical profession.
Mrs Quinn, 65, had fought a num-ber of ailments, including chronic spinal pain and emphysema, for many years but her condition worsened following an operation to remove a disc from her back.
And then Mr Quinn said she was misprescribed antibiotics in May 2008, which had made her suffer-ing worse and she lost a lot of weight. The inquest heard that she was found dead in the cellar of her home by her husband on Septem-ber 16 last year, having suffered a serious self-inflicted injury. She had left notes for her family.
Mr Quinn said his wife had “made her peace” with various family members in the days and weeks before her death. She had also told him that she did not think she was able to recover from the effects of her weight loss.
Her health had deteriorated to the extent she was unable to wear normal clothes and spent much of her time in a nightdress. While she had previously enjoyed dining out with her daughters, this had diminished as she became more unwell, the inquest heard.
Mr Quinn said: “She was a really bouncy and lively person who was the life and soul of the party. She was a talented musician and rec-orded a CD for the family a few years ago.
“She brought up six children with a rod of iron... then ill health made her so poorly in the end that she could not face life any more.”
Consultant pathologist Dr Walid Salman said 35 diazepam tablets had been found in Mrs Quinn’s stomach during a post-mortem examination.
Recording a suicide verdict, East Lancs coroner Richard Taylor said it was tragic such a “vivacious” woman had become the anti-thesis of all she used to stand for.
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