A HEREFORD inquest heard that lessons had been learned over the suicide of a long-standing psychiatric patient on leave from the city's Stonebow Unit. Police found Philip Huckstep dead at his home - close to both the unit and Hereford central police station - three hours after he was first reported to them as missing.

The inquest was told of another three-hour gap before worries about the 54-year-old's whereabouts were passed to the police in the first place. Stonebow staff tried to contact Mr Huckstep when he didn't return on time, but his mobile wouldn't take incoming calls.

Both the Stonebow Unit and the police have changed missing persons procedures as a result of Mr Huckstep's death, the inquest heard.

Unit psychiatrist Dr Chris Thomas said that staff now made sure patients could be contacted while on leave. Chief Insp Sarah Corteen, of West Mercia Police, said that new call centre practices were in place after an internal investigation.

Chief Insp Corteen confirmed, in evidence, that though the police call centre was told at 8pm on April 11 last year that Mr Huckstep was missing, no action was taken until 11pm. Mr Huckstep had been due back at the unit at 4.30pm that day.

Chief Insp Corteen said that, given the circumstances, she would look for officers to be deployed immediately in such a situation.

Officers found Mr Huckstep hanged on the second floor of his home in Coningsby Street, just minutes away from both the unit and Hereford central police station. He had been admitted at the unit a month earlier after hospital treatment to wrist and throat wounds.

Dr Thomas said, in evidence, that Mr Huckstep had a long history of depression and attempts on his life.

County coroner David Halpern said the death of Mr Huckstep was a suicide and that, while it was right to question the time gap between the Stonebow staff telling the police the patient was missing and officers finding the body, he was satisfied that all the lessons had been learned.

It was, said Mr Halpern, difficult to say what would have happened had people reacted differently.