20 Media coverage alerted the Ombudsman to a case of possible care failure in relation to an elderly citizen. Allegedly, local authority employees had on several occasions forgotten to give the elderly citizen the prescribed medication. The local authority had itself initiated an investigation of the case and, as a first step, the Ombudsman therefore asked the local authority to send him the results of its investigation. The local authority admitted that the process in relation to the elderly citizen had not been handled satisfactorily. It had taken various initiatives to avoid recurrences. On the basis of the information provided by the local au­ thority, the Ombudsman decided to close his investigation of the case. All Ombudsman legal case officers read a local or national newspaper to watch out for cases which the Ombudsman should take up on his own initiative. The Ombudsman frequently opens a case in response to media coverage but closes it again soon afterwards, for instance because the authorities themselves have dealt with the issue in an appropriate way. On behalf of her brother, a woman asked a ministry to reconsider a previously settled case. After 18 months, the case was still pending and the woman lodged a complaint with the Ombudsman about the ministry’s case processing time. In connection with the Ombudsman investi­ gation of the case, the ministry stated that it deeply regretted the long processing time. It also admitted that regrettable and very regret­ table errors had been made in connection with the case processing. The ministry informed the Ombudsman that it had issued an internal reminder emphasising that the guidelines for processing this type of case must be followed and that it would monitor that they were followed in future. The ministry also made a decision on the case. The woman was sent a copy of the ministry’s reply for her information. She then contacted the Ombudsman to withdraw her complaint on the grounds that the ministry’s statement had produced the desired result: a decision on her brother’s case, an apology for the long case processing time and initiatives to prevent a similar experience in other cases. The Ombudsman therefore closed his investigation without making a statement on the case. The Ombudsman’s work is to a large extent aimed at solutions rather than criticism. Among other things, this means that if an authority itself identifies any errors and endeavours to prevent recurrences, the Om­ budsman may in certain circumstances choose to close the case without making an actual statement, for instance if the complainant is satisfied by the authority’s reactions, because there is then no need for the Ombudsman to establish and criticise the errors as well.