A WOMAN found with her head in a bath of water at a North Lancashire nursing home died of a heart attack, not drowning, an inquest in Lancaster found.

Monica Needham, 63, was discovered by staff at Hillcroft nursing home, Caton Green Road, Brookhouse on February 22.

Blackpool and Fylde coroner Mr Samuel Lee recorded a verdict of death by natural causes at the inquest on Tuesday.

He said that while the circumstances of the death were unusual, medical evidence pointed overwhelmingly to a heart attack as the main cause of death.

Mrs Needham, originally from Barrow, suffered from a rare form of dementia known as Picks Disease, which affects the personality of the sufferer.

Her son, Geoffrey Needham of Keppleway Drive, Barrow, said: "I last saw my mother three days before her death, and we actually commented that it was a good visit and we were in good spirits."

The matron of the nursing home, Mrs Cecilia Westerholm said that in the past, Mrs Needham's condition had manifested itself as her telling stories over and over again. Later, she began to stuff things into her mouth and take food from the plates of other patients.

Most recently, she had begun to walk into a bathroom and start to run baths. Mrs Westerholm suggested that Mrs Needham had begun this habit because she had previously worked in a care home herself.

On the day of her death, water from a bath overflowed and was spotted by staff. Mrs Needham was found with her face and shoulders under water.

Staff tried to revive her, said Mrs Westerholm, but without success.

Consultant pathologist Dr Robert William Blewett carried out a post mortem on Mrs Needham.

A blockage in her arteries was sufficiently serious for it to be fatal instantly or within a few seconds, said Dr Blewett.

She had some fluid on her lungs, but, responding to a question from Mr Needham, Dr Blewett said this was normal in heart attack cases.

Mr Lee, summed up by stressing that he was unable to consider if the level of observation was sufficient because she died before or seconds after her heart attack, rather than by drowning.

Mr Lee said: "What I am being told is that Mrs Needham suffered a massive heart attack and she was probably dead before she fell into the bath water."