A nursing home could not have stopped a pensioner who suffered from dementia wandering upstairs to an area marked staff only, an inquest heard.

Retired seamstress Elizabeth Dellman, who was 89 and lived at Wingfield Court, Bingley, died 13 days after falling down six carpeted steps at the home in Priestthorpe Road.

She had previously been taken to Airedale General Hospital but was discharged after x-rays, under the care of her GP, district nurses and staff at the home.

However, she died at Wingfield on November 27 last year from bronchopnemonia due to a bleed on her brain.

Home manger Emma Rushton described widow Mrs Dellman as “fiercely independent” and “wandersome” who would make the most of all of the space on the ground floor.

The hearing in Bradford yesterday was told how the home had previously been issued with a warning notice from the Care Quality Commission that it needed more staff and this had been upped by seven hours a day.

Assistant Deputy Coroner Oliver Longstaff said in his view staffing levels at the home had no bearing on the circumstances leading to Mrs Dellman's fall.

Recording a verdict of accidental death Mr Longstaff said: "You can't put fences and barriers all over a building. She was fiercely independent, she wandered about and it seems unlikely that staff could have prevented her access to those stairs if that's what she chose to do."