AN inquest has been held into the tragic death of a Carlisle woman.

Sally Louise Jones, who was born in Derbyshire but lived and worked in Carlisle, sadly passed away on July 8, 2021.

The inquest, which was led by Dr Nicholas Shaw, heard witness statements describing a history of a difficult relationship with alcohol that the deceased experienced.

It was heard that following two failed marriages, the loss of her father, and stress from her work and debt, that she overused alcohol.

Sally ran a hair salon; however with the stress of running that and falling behind on rent payments - leading to pressure from the landlord - she left the salon and began working as a carer in a care home.

The care home work started in 2020 where she unfortunately caught Covid, which affected her health, and along with working 12-hour days and the stress from distressed residents, her overuse of alcohol continued, the coroners' court was told.

The inquest heard that she was drinking roughly a bottle of vodka a day.

Her physical health was affected by a development of pancreatitis, an inflammation of the pancreas, a condition that is most commonly caused by alcohol overuse.

The overuse of alcohol also led to her thoughts being affected negatively.

It was heard in the inquest that she had attempted to end her life and harm herself on a number of occasions.

Sally was using several medications, but one of the most notable ones, the coroner said, was chlorpheniramine, which is sold under the commercial name Piriton.

It is an anti-inflammatory which is used mostly for treating hay fever, which she suffered from.

A statement from PC Parish described how Sally was found laying peacefully on her bed, with medication by her side.

The postmortem report stated that her body showed a low amount of alcohol, but a high amount of chlorpheniramine.

Dr Shaw concluded: "Poor Sally has just slipped away from people.

"Heaven knows she's had a lot of stress in her life, particularly with family bereavement and illness with Covid.

"She was always committed to her work, but alcohol is insidious, it's so easy to take and to buy, it's far more dangerous than tobacco because it's easier to obtain.

"However despite being an alcoholic, she didn't die due to alcohol, it wasn't anything to do with that."

The conclusion of the cause of Sally's death was an inadvertent overdose of chlorpheniramine.