The chief social officer for Northern Ireland has insisted that it would be wrong for any hospital or care home staff to put up “do not resuscitate” (DNR) notices for patients without consulting their families first.

Sean Holland made his comment at the Stormont health committee on Thursday after a number of politicians complained that some families were being pressurised to agree to no resuscitation stipulations for their loved ones in Northern Ireland hospitals and care homes.

DUP North Down MLA Alex Easton said on Thursday morning he received an email from the family of a woman at the Ulster Hospital in east Belfast who said a DNR notice was put against that patient even though she was “conscious and she was not told this was happening”.

Mr Easton said her family was not contacted about the DNR notice. He asked the chief social officer Mr Holland for assurance “that people’s lives are not being decided without consultation with their loved ones because if that is the case that it totally unacceptable”.

Sinn Féin Assembly member Martina Anderson who referred to accounts of such action happening at some care homes and said such reports were “deeply worrying, against clinical guidance and are simply unacceptable”.