AN INVESTIGATION has been launched after a patient died suddenly at the Royal Bolton Hospital.

The Bolton News understands a man is thought to have bled to death in the hospital's high dependency unit in March.

Health chiefs have now set up a serious case review panel to look into the incident.

A director from the Bolton NHS Foundation Trust will lead the investigation and a report will be presented to the trust board and the NHS Bolton Clinical Commisioning Group (CCG).

The hospital's head of communications, Heather Edwards, said: “We can confirm that we have had an incident in which sadly a patient died unexpectedly.

“We have set up a serious case review panel to look into this to see what, if anything, could have been done differently.

“A final report will go to our board, the CCG, and the family once the review has been completed.”

The police are not involved in the investigation.

Findings of the investigation could be passed to the coroner once the trust has completed the review.