THE DRIVER of a car in which an 88-year-old woman died may have suffered an epileptic attack an inquest heard on Tuesday.

Pauline Rodgers, aged 70, was on her way to the Cotswolds towns of Broadway and Moreton-in-Marsh with her mother-in-law Elsie Rodgers when she lost control of her car on the A4538 Worcester Road in Evesham last October.

The car left the road hitting a roadworks sign, then the left hand pole of a large road sign and then a hedge.

The car, a Ford Escort, then rolled back into the road in front of a Peugeot 406, rolled in the air and landed on its roof.

Elsie Rodgers, of Harborne, Birmingham, was certified dead at the scene by paramedics and a post mortem later revealed that the cause of death was a fracture of the cervical spine.

Police experts investigating the accident had not been able to find a reason why the car had gone out of control, and Pauline Rodgers said that she could not remember anything that happened between leaving home and after the accident.

She had suffered from "blank and unresponsive times" before and when she visited her GP for tests it was found that she may be suffering from a form of epilepsy the court was told.

Worcestershire coroner Victor Round said it was only speculation, but it seemed that Mrs Rodgers may have suffered "fade out - a petit mal".

He recorded a verdict of accidental death of Mrs Elsie Rodgers.