A GRIEVING husband says hospital staff were responsible for the death of his wife, who gave birth on its maternity ward.

Zahra Ghaznavi, 28, of Central Road, Wembley, was the third woman to die at Northwick Park Hospital in just ten months, causing the trust which runs it to launch an internal review into maternity care.

Her husband, Nasim, told the Harrow Times he found it too painful to talk about the woman he lost in March, but he described the events he believes led to her death.

What should have been one of the happiest periods of his life turned into a tragedy when Zahra fell into a coma less than a week after giving birth to their daughter Sahar.

Nasim, who runs a tailoring business, said on March 20, the day she died, a doctor at Northwick Park Hospital told him staff on the maternity ward were responsible for her death, which was caused by a bacterial infection.

After the delivery, he says, she suffered from internal bleeding and doctors plugged her birth canal with tissue.

But he claims they did not change it or take it out for two days and he believes it may have been responsible for the infection.

He said: "I felt very bad. At first we were happy because the baby came but then she had to go to the operation room because there were problems."

He said the coma hit when the bacteria spread up to her chest and eventually to her brain, despite surgeons taking out a section of tissue from her body in an attempt to remove it.

After an agonising wait, a doctor sat Nasim down to tell him the news that would change the course of his life.

He said Nasim and Zahra had become like a son and daughter to him, but he had to tell Nasim his wife had a one per cent chance of survival. He said they would only be able to wait a day before turning off her life support.

Nasim says he noticed a lot that disturbed him throughout the time he spent on the ward, leading up to the birth and during the time she was unwell.

He said the nurse who was helping Zahra asked for support from her colleagues but was refused it, and so had to take on the job by herself.

He said: "This hospital has made a lot of mistakes.

"For 11 days I was there looking after my wife and the same doctor who was helping us with the operation was serving us food, so what do you think is going to happen?

"At the same time a doctor is a nurse and then becomes a caterer as well. I will not go back there, I hate this hospital."

I met Nasim in his two bedroom flat in Wembley, where he sat smoking while a television, nestled beside a stereo, played persian pop songs.

We were waiting for his cousin to arrive and translate some of the more complicated aspects of what happened, but his new home tells the story just as well.

The flat is far too small for the family he should be supporting, and he shares it with a friend instead of the woman he might have spent the rest of his life with.

His baby daughter stays with another cousin in Reading, where Nasim spends every other evening.

But he suffers from headaches, which his GP can neither explain nor treat, and he thinks he may be suffering from depression.

Nasim's life was torn apart and now he can only wait to get an official account of what went wrong.

If the result says the hospital is to blame he plans to take legal action.

An inquest into Zahra's death is expected to take place on September 24, but Nasim has been promised a private meeting with staff, and a draft result of an internal investigation launched following her death was sent to the Healthcare Commission, a government watchdog on Friday.

The report will also look into two other deaths on the ward, which both took place last year.

A post mortem said Zahra's death was caused by E Coli and Septicemia.

Sarah McKellar, a spokesman for North West London Hospitals NHS Trust, which runs Northwick Park, said the it is taking Nasim's concerns seriously but will not be able to publish the outcome of the investigation until staff have spoken to him first.

She said: "We would like to re-iterate our deepest condolences to Mr Ghaznavi and his family at what must be a very difficult and upsetting time for them."