Two health boards have been told to apologise to the family of a pensioner who underwent a operation to cure her cancer � when in fact the disease was so advanced the operation could never have saved her.

Two health boards have been told to apologise to the family of a pensioner who underwent a operation to cure her cancer - when in fact the disease was so advanced the operation could never have saved her.

The Scottish Public Services Ombudsman found that the Lanarkshire NHS Board had failed on four counts in the treatment of the 64-year-old patient, known as Mrs A, after a series of complaints were submitted in June 2005 by her son, Mr C.

He complained to Monklands Hospital that a hysterectomy operation was carried out in the hope of a cure for her cancer - two days before a detailed scan showed her condition was terminal.

He criticised a delay in making a correct diagnosis of cancer and a failure to explain the extent of his mother's condition by consultants at Monklands Hospital and the Beatson Oncology Centre.

He said a subsequent hysterectomy should not, therefore, have been performed and she was caused pain and suffering which should have been avoided.

The report said: "Mr C said that his mother had been in continuous pain and misery from the date of her operation until her death. The treatment his mother received had made the last seven months of her life a living hell'."

The SPSO said Lanarkshire NHS Board, which was responsible for four of the counts, and Greater Glasgow and Clyde NHS Board, named in one, should apologise to the family.

The decision came just three months after the public standards watchdog failed the Lanarkshire NHS Board on four separate counts in their treatment of a 76-year-old cancer patient at Monklands. It agreed the hospital had failed to provide sufficient nursing care to a dying woman whose family had to keep her cool with wet paper towels in her final hours.

The SPSO report's findings published yesterday show that Mrs A's problems began when, on March 16, 2004, she was referred by her GP for a routine appointment to the Gynaecology Clinic at Monklands Hospital with post-menopausal bleeding while on hormone replacement therapy.

Mrs A was told at the clinic in May, 2004, that "no gross abnormality was seen" as a result of examinations.

After the pensioner's GP wrote to the consultant a month later to explain that the patient continued to bleed every day a hysteroscopy, a procedure that allows a doctor to examine the womb, was organised. A fortnight after undergoing the procedure on September 16, 2004, it was discovered she had endometrial cancer and arrangements were made for her to be admitted for hysterectomy.

The family were told by the hospital consultant that the cancer had a favourable treatment success rate of around 80%, and that five years life expectancy would not be overconfident following hysterectomy and radiotherapy for such a condition.

A subsequent MRI scan undertaken on October 14 found that there was a large tumour of the uterus and evidence of local spread into the pelvis.

But the results were not known until October 29 - two days after the hysterectomy was carried out.

A bone scan over a month later showed that the cancer had spread to her bones.

A consultant gynaecological oncological surgeon who advised the ombudsman said that it was "quite disgraceful" for an MRI scan in such an important case to take 15 days to report.

The hospital consultant dealing with the case admitted carrying out the operation without waiting for the MRI report which "may have been an error of judgement".

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde said after the findings were published: "We will be ensuring that any recommendations advised by the ombudsman will be taken forward."