The family of a 34-year-old man who has struggled through repeated medical ordeals have sharply criticised the Bermuda Hospitals Board after failing to get an investigation and root-cause analysis — six months after what they claim was a series of blunders in his treatment.

Jeanna Outerbridge, the mother of Dandre Outerbridge, told The Royal Gazette: “We feel that he’s in the predicament that he’s in because of King Edward VII Memorial Hospital’s negligence.”

Mr Outerbridge’s hardship began in late 2019, when he was struck down with viral encephalitis, a serious brain inflammation, that left him struggling through lengthy and expensive treatment abroad.

Compounding the family’s woes at the time was a failure by his employer both to provide health insurance and to inform him of the lack of coverage, leaving them with more than $300,000 in medical bills.

Mr Outerbridge suffered from three strokes in 2019 that left him largely non-verbal and struggling with mobility.

His family said he attended KEMH this year on January 5, showing “a possible seizure and excessive mucous”.

However, by the second morning in hospital, Mr Outerbridge had not been seen by a neurologist and continued to deteriorate. At the family’s insistence, he was briefly seen by a neurologist on January 7.

The family’s January 28 letter of complaint to the BHB stated: “In less than five minutes, he advised that Dandre must be sent overseas to Lahey [Clinic], stated he would be admitted to the ICU for monitoring pending air ambulance transfer and then left without explanation or discussion.”

They maintained that repeated requests for clinical explanations of his treatment went unanswered.

The family met with hospital officials on January 8, citing “escalating concerns about a lack of urgency, poor communication and the absence of concrete action regarding medical evacuation”.

The letter added: “We were assured that a root-cause analysis would be conducted for all matters discussed in this complaint.”

Mr Outerbridge’s family said that “critical” information such as electroencephalogram results, medication changes and Mr Outerbridge’s plummeting blood-platelet count were not shared.

“Throughout this hospitalisation, Dandre was subjected to significant physical and emotional stress.

“He remained semi-conscious for prolonged periods, was repeatedly handled and repositioned without explanation, experienced untreated hypothermia, bradycardia, hunger, dehydration and abrupt medical changes, and was left without consistent physician oversight.”

The family said the “profound emotional and psychological distress” on Mr Outerbridge and his relatives, after his long and stressful medical history, was of equal concern.

“The family had already endured a traumatic medical crisis in 2019 involving multiple strokes, profound hospitalisation and fear for Dandre’s life. This prior trauma was explicitly communicated to staff.”

They also criticised the handling of transfer logistics when Mr Outerbridge was handed over to the medevac team, and said no physician was present to formally hand over care.

The family’s claim also states that Mr Outerbridge’s EEG results showed “no indication of seizure”.

Mrs Outerbridge told the Gazette this month: “He was not a seizure patient. All he had was respiratory problems and pneumonia.”

The complaint letter stated they were informed by a neurologist at the Lahey Clinic in Massachusetts: “We are not sure why Dandre was sent here.”

Mr Outerbridge’s difficulties worsened after he fractured his hip in a fall while overseas.

Since the event, the family have been paying off a $38,000 bill to the Lady Cubitt Compassionate Association. As of this month, the actual costs to date were said to be $43,473.

They said that, as a result of the broken hip, Mr Outerbridge required additional rehabilitation to “assist him in getting back to where he was before he left Bermuda”. The cost to date for the additional rehab was said to be $2,717.

The complaint states: “These events represent a profound failure of duty of care.

“At every stage, the family were forced to advocate aggressively for basic information, appropriate monitoring and fundamental medical decision-making.

“Dandre’s safety, dignity and wellbeing were repeatedly compromised by inaction, miscommunication, denial of patient advocacy and disregard for both his clinical condition and his family’s documented trauma story.”

Mrs Outerbridge contacted the Gazette six months after their formal complaint was filed with the BHB in January 2026. She said the hospital’s patient relations manager “never answered or acknowledged the complaint”.

While the BHB cannot comment on specific patients, a spokeswoman said: “BHB has a policy on complaint resolution which details the process which must be used. Formal complaints can be made directly to the patient relations manager or to BHB management or staff, who will relay it to the patient relations manager.”

The BHB outlined what the patient relations manager policy provides.

However, Mrs Outerbridge insisted that the policy as articulated had not been followed.

She said the family “didn’t hear back from the BHB until late March”. She said they met subsequently with Judy Richardson, the acting chief executive of the BHB, who appeared uninformed of the substance of the family’s complaint.

Mrs Outerbridge added: “I requested that we hear back from the BHB with a date to address the complaint, writing 24 to 48 hours after that meeting.

“The next day, we got an e-mail from an external law firm stating that the BHB had reverted to them. That was April 9, 2026. We have not heard anything from the lawyers, nor have we had any communication from the BHB at all since we received that e-mail.

“We intentionally waited until after May 8, 2026, to reach out to the law firm as a follow-up, and there has been absolutely no response to date. I have called, left messages, e-mailed, spoken to the interim chief financial officer, called, left messages and still have not received a response at all from the BHB to date. So none of this policy has been followed at all.”