Birmingham Children's Hospital chief executive quits ahead of probe report
The inquiry has been looking into complaints including allegations of unnecessary delays affecting liver and kidney transplants, brain surgery, face deformity and also vascular and interventional radiology services.
A Whitehall source has disclosed that chief investigator Nigel Ellis and his team uncovered evidence that seemed to endorse many of the concerns.
He added that the report is believed to say some patients unnecessarily underwent major surgery designed to diagnose or treat their conditions because the hospital could not offer them interventional radiology, a treatment seen as much more invasive and not requiring surgery.
Surgeons’ complaints sparked a local inquiry by primary care trust bosses last summer, including claims that Children’s Hospital operating staff could not even recognise the correct equipment.
One surgeon described the liver transplant service as so poorly run that it had become “a third-class service” and a severe lack of beds at the hospital was causing unnecessary delays, putting transplant patients’ lives at risk.
They also claimed there was a lack of confidence in managers.
Another said parents were being told lies about the unnecessary procedures because they could not admit that the Children’s Hospital lacked the personnel and equipment to offer an alternative.
The Health Secretary and Prime Minister Gordon Brown later called for another independent inquiry by watchdog the Healthcare Commission in October.
Since the complaints, Birmingham Children’s Hospital theatre staff are being made to watch operations at other hospitals as part of a re-training programme.
Ward 10, which was at the centre of complaints over staffing shortages, also now has a new ward manager.
Birmingham Children’s Hospital sees a third of a million patients a year and last year coped with an additional 10,000 outpatients consultations more than the previous year.
