A hospital has launched an independent investigation into claims a 46-year-old man was left paralysed from the waist down after staff failed to spot abscesses on his spine in time to treat them.

David Butler was admitted to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in King's Lynn on four occasions in 2021 when he was suffering from infections.

In December, the 46-year-old former taxi driver from Terrington was rushed to Addenbrooke's Hospital for emergency spinal surgery. But his family fear that by then, it was too late to prevent him from becoming paraplegic.

Dr Frankie Swords, medical director at the QEH, said: “We are very sorry to hear that Mr Butler’s family are disappointed with our standards of care.

"Our clinical teams have reviewed Mr Butler’s case and feel that an independent investigation is necessary for us to provide a conclusive response to all of the family’s questions.

"We will share the findings of this review in full with the family upon completion and where there is learning for us as an organisation, we will reflect and act on this.”

The investigation will be overseen by a senior clinician from another hospital trust.

Mr Butler suffers from severe depression, anxiety and PTSD and finds it hard to communicate or make himself understood without his wife Esther helping.

But Mrs Butler said she was not allowed to accompany her husband when he was admitted to A&E in December.

Mrs Butler, 48, has worked as a nurse for 30 years, spending 23 of them at the QEH.

"I feel very let down by the NHS, and feel that as a wife and a nurse, the NHS should learn to listen to relatives of patients as they know them best," she said.

"If the hospital had allowed me into A&E and properly listened to what was going on, we would most probably not be in this position.

"Prior to this David was independently mobile, but our whole lives will now have to change dramatically. We don’t even know if our house can be adapted appropriately for David to return here."

On December 3, Mr Butler had to be hoisted out of his terraced house by firemen, through an upstairs window which had to be removed, as they were unable to get him down the stairs as he had no control of his lower body.

The air ambulance was also called so that the doctor could give him some strong pain relief as he was in such excruciating pain.

It was more than five hours before he got to the hospital, by which time he was very distressed.

When he arrived at A&E, he was not able to clearly explain what had been happening and his wife was not allowed to accompany him to explain his symptoms, because of restrictions to stop the spread of Covid.

On December 6, Mrs Butler told doctors by phone that her husband had problems with his legs. When they looked at them, they found he was paralysed.

After a scan on December 9, he was urgently transferred to Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge the following day for spinal surgery.

A spinal consultant said he had found multiple abscesses in his lungs and spine, which had damaged his spinal cord, causing the paralysis and incontinence.

"The consultant at Addenbrooke's said if they had found them sooner, he wouldn't have been paralysed," said Mrs Butler.

She said: "This has been devastating to both us and all our family and friends, and we need the NHS as a whole to learn to listen in the future so something similar does not happen to anyone else in the future.

"As a nurse, I do understand the limitations due to Covid and that this was why I was not allowed into A&E, but I think patients and their loved ones should be treated as individuals rather than all being treated exactly the same."

Mr Butler has now been referred to a specialist spinal hospital in Sheffield for rehab, which is likely to take months.