A WOMAN who had avoided leaving her home for 40 years due to agoraphobia died after a simple fall in her apartment, the Dublin City Coroner’s Court heard.
Mary Dunne (78) was found by her brother Thomas at her apartment in Rory O’Connor House on Hardwicke Street, Dublin, on September 25th, 2009.
It appeared that Ms Dunne had fallen from the armchair and was found in the corner of the room. She was hypothermic, indicating that she had fallen some time in the night after speaking to her brother on the telephone at about 11pm and her bed was not slept in.
When her brother discovered her during his morning visit he called an ambulance which took Ms Dunne to the Mater hospital where she died a short time later.
Ms Dunne lived by herself and had suffered from agoraphobia, high blood pressure and osteoporosis and was in poor general health as she had effectively stopped eating despite her family’s attempts to find food which she would eat.
In May 2008 she refused an offer for meals on wheels to be brought to her home. A postmortem carried out on September 26th, 2009 found Ms Dunne had coronary artery disease which had been previously undiagnosed. She had a bruise in the tissue over her left eye and on her arm consistent with a simple fall. She had a fracture in her lumbar spine and there was extensive bleeding in her abdomen.
Dublin city coroner Dr Brian Farrell said the cause of her death was the fall which caused a lumbar fracture which bled into her abdomen and recorded an accidental death due to a fall.