AN SNP MP who lost her only child when he was stillborn after doctors failed to spot she was suffering from a serious complication is urging Shona Robison to overhaul the way complaints of medical negligence are investigated.

Patricia Gibson wants an independent body to be set up to consider serious allegations of breaches of care and for it to be given time limits to reach its conclusions.

She is speaking out after an 18-month long hospital inquiry into her baby’s death and a subsequent six year legal battle which she says added to her grief.

Gibson, who was elected the MP for Arran and North Ayrshire last year, battled fertility problems and struggled for years to conceive, eventually turning to IVF with her husband Kenneth, the SNP MSP.

But the couple’s joy turned to devastation when their son, also named Kenneth, was found to have died in her womb a day after his due date.

Doctors had failed to diagnose Gibson was suffering from pre-eclampsia, which if diagnosed would have saved her son’s life.

“The hospital has never apologised and to me that suggests my baby did not matter. Until it does I have no confidence it has taken steps to make sure such a tragedy does not happen again,” she said.

“Getting answers is all part of the grieving process. But to wait for answers, to feel no progress is being made and to see no one take responsibility compounds the loss.

“In my view the investigation was not about my baby, it was about people in the hospital covering their backs.”

She added: “I have written to Health Secretary Shona Robison to say that when mistakes are made health boards should not be allowed to investigate themselves.

“I would like patients who have serious allegations of negligence or breaches of care to be able to take their cases to an independent body and for the body to have a clear time limit to reach its conclusions. It is key that the investigation should not be carried out by the health board running the hospital which is the subject of the complaint.”

Speaking to The National about her loss, Gibson said she underwent IVF twice, losing the first pregnancy at 11 weeks, before she became pregnant again on her second attempt.

At the age of 42 and because she had had IVF, her case was regarded as “high risk”.

Her pregnancy developed smoothly but she began experiencing excruciating pains on her due date on October 13 2009.

But when she turned up at the Southern General Hospital in Glasgow and sought to get admitted to have the baby she was told to go home and lie down.

She and her husband returned home, but when her condition became more severe, she returned to the hospital later and was finally taken in.

Her baby’s heart rate was normal at 11pm that night.

However, the next morning doctors on a routine ward round failed to detect the baby’s heartbeat and they discovered he had died.

Gibson was sedated, but while waiting for her baby to be delivered her own health deteriorated and she experienced a “seizure”.

A report commissioned by Gibson as part of her legal action makes clear that if proper tests had been carried out when Gibson arrived in hospital on October 13, pre eclampsia would have been diagnosed, prompting the baby to have been delivered safely.

“One of the things that I can never reconcile myself to is that Kenneth’s death was avoidable”, she said.

“When I left the hospital they said an investigation would be carried out and lessons would be learnt. But 18 months on, I had nothing from them. I chased them and eventually I got one A4 sheet of paper which I couldn’t make head or tail of.

“There was no mention of consultants or doctors, it was all midwife A, midwife B. It was all about pushing it down the chain of responsibility. I told them I was unhappy with the report. I said I had waited 18 months and expected something of more substance. The report I had been handed looked like something that had been pulled off a shelf to shut someone up.”

She later raised a legal action against NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, which settled the case for a small sum in March this year but did not accept liability for the death.

“I would have been happy with nothing if they had given me an apology and an acknowledgement that I had been failed,” she said.

“As it was the health board fought every step of the way. At one point they even tried to suggest I may have been at fault as I missed one of the classes. They were wriggling all the time.”

Gibson says she will always grieve for her baby son and has tried to rebuild her life through a busy career at Westminster where she was elected as one of the SNP 56 last year.

“People react to emotional trauma in very different ways. My reaction to it is to keep myself incredibly busy which my job as an MP very much does,” she said.

Health Secretary Shona Robison said: “This is an extremely sad case and of course my sympathies are with Patricia and her family.

“While it’s vital that any unexpected death is properly investigated, we must also acknowledge that lengthy investigations can be upsetting for the families concerned.”

She added: “The 2016 Health Act, passed by parliament earlier this year, also contains measures to ensure that organisations are open and honest with people when unexpected or unintended harm happens which results in death or serious injury.”

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde said: “We can confirm that an out of court settlement was reached regarding this case but it would inappropriate to comment on the detail of this.”