An inquest has concluded that a pharmacy error did not contribute to the death of an 82-year-old woman.

Well Pharmacy previously admitted errors had been made in dispensing medication to Chatham woman Rachel Sands, prior to her death at Medway Hospital on December 31 2020.

At a hearing in December last year area coroner Bina Patel was told that Miss Sands had been mistakenly given the anti-depressant fluoxetine by Well Pharmacy in Magpie Hall Road, Chatham, in November 2020, instead of furosemide, which had been prescribed to treat water retention problems.

Son Rocky Troiani told the hearing he had discovered the error on November 18, when he returned from holiday and found his mother confused, unable to communicate and shaking.

On December 31 he had walked into his mother’s bedroom to find her “crying and moaning” and said she had been choking on her own vomit.

But the same hearing recorded evidence that the medication was unlikely to have contributed to her death.

The inquest was adjourned and formally concluded this month, recording that her death was the result of natural causes.

The medical causes were listed as 1a) upper gastro-intestinal haemorrhage and Covid-19 infection, 1b) liver cirrhosis with oesophageal ulceration, ischaemic heart disease and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; and II) chronic kidney disease.