When the letter arrived from the hospital saying a date had been set for Frederick Allen's appointment, it came as something of a shock.
Not because, like many patients, he had waited so long he had almost given up hope of ever being seen. But because he has, in fact, been dead for 40 years.
So it was with incredulous eyes that his 71 year old daughter Margaret McKinney read and re-read the official missive from the University Hospital of North Staffordshire in Stoke-on-Trent, which has some of the longest waiting times in the country.
"When I opened the letter I had to read it three times because I just couldn't believe it," she said yesterday.
Pensioner receives letter from hospital saying her father who died 40 years ago needs check-up | the Daily Mail
A bit of a cock-up for sure.
