Nelsons’ Personal Injury Associate Dianne Collins is acting on behalf of over 40 Claimants who were admitted, as children, to Aston Hall Hospital in Derby in the 1960’s/70’s.
Aston Hall Hospital
Since 2011, former patients at Aston Hall Hospital have alleged they were admitted to the psychiatric institution, unnecessarily, via social services and/or the probation service. All of the Claimants were under the care of the same psychiatrist, Dr Kenneth Milner, whom they alleged ‘experimented’ on them by subjecting them to a form of psychotherapy known as ‘narco-analysis’. This form of therapy is conducted while the patient is in a sleep like state induced by barbiturates or other drugs, as a means of releasing repressed feelings, thoughts or memories.
The Claimants were given strong drugs, such as Sodium Amytal (also known as Amobarbital) and that the use of this barbiturate derivative and this form of therapy was unnecessary, carried out without consent in inappropriate circumstances and was totally unsuitable as a form of treatment for any child, let alone those whose only problems were behavioural. Some of the Claimants were as young as ten years old when they were subjected to this ‘treatment’.
Some Claimants have also claimed that they were physically, emotionally and sexually abused, both whilst under the influence of these drugs and undergoing this treatment, and by other members of staff during their stay at the hospital.
Derbyshire Police & Derbyshire Safeguarding Children Board Report
The report undertaken jointly by Derbyshire Police and Derbyshire Safeguarding Children Board found that 65 patients were induced by barbiturates or other drugs to a comatose like state, and were then subjected to abuse.
Aston Hall Hospital Abuse Claims
If you were a patient at Aston Hall Mental Hospital and would like some advice, please contact Dianne Collins on 0800 024 1976 or via our online contact form for confidential, free advice on whether you can make a claim.