Woman, 27, took her own life minutes after phone call with NHS worker who let her hang up, inquest hears

Published: 15:39, 20 April 2026 | Updated: 15:41, 20 April 2026 A woman took her own life only minutes after a phone call with an NHS worker who let her hang up, an inquest has heard. Hollie Loraine, 27, expressed to a 111 NHS call handler that she wanted to end her life moments before she was allowed to put down the call.  A coroner has now issued a warning after it was found the call handler was following national guidelines.   The inquest heard Ms Loraine had told phoned 111 and detailed exactly how she planned to take her own life. The handler responded by saying, 'I can let you go now that I've got that help in place' and instructed Ms Loraine to ring back 'if her condition got worse or had new symptoms'. She was then permitted to hang up the phone and ended her life minutes later, before help could arrive.  David Place, the Senior Coroner for Sunderland, has since written a Prevention of Future Deaths Report following the inquest into Miss Loraine's death. Mr Place was concerned that call handlers do not receive guidance about maintaining phone contact with a suicidal patient.  A woman took her own life only minutes after a 111 phone call with an NHS worker who let her hang up, an inquest has heard (Pictured: Sunderland Coroner's Court) The inquest concluded Ms Loraine died by misadventure at her home in Washington, Sunderland, on August 30 2025. Mr Place's report said: 'On the day of her death, Hollie telephoned the North East Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust's 111 service at 05.22 hours. 'Hollie indicated that she was feeling suicidal and had made her mind up over the last five days.' 'She indicated to the operator that she was about to end her life.' The report continued: 'The call handler reassured Hollie that help was in place for her and confirmed that the door to the property was open. 'The call handler then said, 'I can let you go now that I've got that help in place, is that alright?' Hollie said thank you and, after being told to ring back if her condition got worse or had new symptoms, Hollie ended the call. 'The evidence revealed that the call handler was following the national NHS pathways system and Hollie was considered as requiring a category 3 response in accordance with the pathway. 'This was correctly upgraded by a clinician following a review.'  The report said the first ambulance crew arrived at Ms Loraine's location at 6.17am, but that she could not be revived.  It added that her call to the service ended at 5.31am, and that she did not respond to the clinician's attempts to call her back at 5.40am, 5.43am and 5.45am. Mr Place went on to say: 'I am concerned that the evidence revealed that the national NHS pathways telephone triage system provides no guidance to health advisers dealing with such calls about whether to maintain telephone contact with a patient who is clearly expressing suicidal intent and, if maintaining contact, how to do so to ameliorate a risk of that patient ending their own life.' The coroner said that Hollie had made her intention to end her life, and how she was going to do this, 'clear' to the call handler. The report was sent to NHS England, which must respond by May 27. No comments have so far been submitted. Why not be the first to send us your thoughts, or debate this issue live on our message boards. By posting your comment you agree to our house rules. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual We will automatically post your comment and a link to the news story to your Facebook timeline at the same time it is posted on MailOnline. To do this we will link your MailOnline account with your Facebook account. We’ll ask you to confirm this for your first post to Facebook. You can choose on each post whether you would like it to be posted to Facebook. Your details from Facebook will be used to provide you with tailored content, marketing and ads in line with our Privacy Policy.