AN NHS Trust has admitted “deficiencies” in its service in response to the suicide of one of its student mental health nurses who suffered her own psychiatric crisis.

Melody Vazquez who had bipolar disorder but worked as a young mental health nurse, was found dead in a field near her home in Finchampstead, some time after multiple suicide attempts.

The 23-year-old told a consultant psychiatrist she was seeing signs that affirmed her belief she needed to end her life - “to bring peace to the world” - and insisted she attempted to end her life to “save mankind from their sins."

A coroner heard Melody was sent home from hospital after receiving psychiatric help, without any plan to monitor her condition or a nominated counsellor to check on her progress.

The inquest heard her psychotherapist, Kay Longworth, had been so concerned about Melody she had asked the home treatment team to contact her but a call handler failed to write down the name during a phone call, so the visit was never made.

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Melody's body was found by a passer-by on April 12 2018 in a field near a golf course in Finchampstead, Wokingham.

Speaking outside the inquest in Reading, Melody's former boyfriend Adam Wilson had lambasted the Trust for the lack of care she was given before her death.

He said: "The opportunity to have averted this was with post discharge care - there is no discharge care, they were playing catch-up and expecting it to work. I think the way that the trust handles this sort of thing is primarily focused on absolving themselves from responsibility.

"She's dead and she shouldn't be. What happened to her is really not unusual."

The Berkshire Coroner, Heidi Connor, also criticised the trust in a letter which has been exclusively revealed through a Freedom of Information request on Tuesday (October 15).

She expressed concerns about how Melody's care co-ordinator was on sick leave during the month after Melody was discharged in January last year and Melody was given no other care co-ordinator because she was not deemed to be especially at risk.

Mrs Connor wrote: “Evidence revealed that from around March 2018, Melody’s care co-ordinator was away from work on sick leave for around a month.

"In fact it would seem from Ms Longworth's statement that she was due to see Melody for four sessions, the fourth of which took place on April 11 2018.

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"Tragically that was the date on which Melody went missing.

"Staff were clearly concerned about Melody at that time and they requested Crisis Resolution and Home Treatment Team (CRHTT) to speak to her. Given the chronology in this case I did not find that this played a part in causing Melody’s death but I am concerned that this could make a difference for other patients.”

Giving evidence at the inquest, Ms Longworth said the CRHTT had never spoken to Melody because a member of the crisis team had failed to log Melody's name.

The coroner had said: "So, it wasn't that the crisis team was too busy or under-staffed, they just didn't note down which patient it was? Is it as simple as that?"

In a response to the Coroner, also revealed by an FOI request, Dr Minoo Irani, medical director at the Berkshire NHS Trust, said: “I agree that deficiency in this aspect of our service could have implications, in general, for the quality and safety of patient care in community based mental health services in Berkshire Healthcare.

“We are committed to improving systems and processes within the trust, to ensure safe care for our patients.”