Nine years since 22-year-old Zachary Gravatt died unexpectedly, his parents are reliving that tragic night at Auckland City Hospital.
The fourth year medical student was killed by septicemia from the C-strain meningococcal bacteria, just over 15 hours after he woke up with a fever on July 8, 2009.
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"We were told that things were not looking good, and just as we were recoiling from this news, another nurse burst into the room and said 'run with me now so you can see Zachary before he dies'," Jennifer Gravatt told the coroner on Wednesday.
In 2011 a coroner found delays in recognising and treating the disease were the fault of the stress the health system is under, rather than individual health workers.
In 2013 the Auckland DHB noted Mr Gravatt might have survived "with different treatment", issued an apology, and made an undisclosed payout to his parents.
The inquest has now been re-opened after new evidence came to light.
Mr Gravatt's mother Jennifer was the first to give evidence on Wednesday, describing the lack of purposeful activity in her son's hospital room.
"I had a very strong desire to hit the red emergency button to get some urgent action for Zachary," she said. "It was only my sense of not wanting to make a fuss, in what was at that time Zachary's place of employment [that stopped me]."
The inquest is expected to last five days.
Newshub.
