Mum 'lost trust' in surgeon review hospital

A mum whose daughter was among more than 200 patients "harmed" after being operated on by a now-suspended NHS surgeon says she has lost trust in the hospital that treated her.

Of the 209 patients who "experienced harm" under the care of orthopaedic surgeon Kuldeep Stohr at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge, 41 were classed as severe and one person died, as first reported by the BBC on Monday.

Lynn, whose 13-year-old daughter Tammy was among the first to receive findings from an independent investigation last year, said the number of patients involved was "ridiculous".

The hospital trust said it was "deeply sorry". Stohr previously said she was fully co-operating with an investigation.

An ongoing review by the Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (CUH) has looked into the care of more than 900 patients so far.

Many of the cases investigated in the review involved children operated on by Stohr.

The figures were published in a report prepared for the trust's board of directors and was published on its website ahead of a meeting on Wednesday.

The trust removed the report after it was contacted by the BBC for comment.

It said a "confidential interim update" was "shared by mistake in our public board papers".

More from Cambridgeshire:

• The city grappling with unreliable phone signal
• 'Our son's law will save generations of children'
• 'I want my Bayeux Tapestry next to the original'

Lynn questioned who had authored the report, "as us relatives don't trust the hospital and what they say now".

"One or two can be classed as a mistake, but this amount – no. It's ridiculous, especially where parents like me have had to see their children go through additional surgery."

Her family's lawyers previously said they had received a written admission of substandard surgery after screws on Tammy's hip joints, meant to improve her mobility, were inserted in the wrong place and did not properly connect to the bone.

Another parent, Natasha, said she was calling for a public inquiry into how children under Stohr's care – including her 19-year-old daughter Neave – came to be harmed.

The trust's final findings are expected to be shared in November. Chief executive Nicola Ayton said it would be shared with patients and their families before it is published.

Elizabeth Maliakal from Hudgell Solicitors, which is representing several families, said she expected the final report to be "damning".

"Some of our clients, who are children, endured major surgery they didn't need, which had no positive impact on their lives, and left them in pain for years afterwards," she said.

"I expect the final report from the trust, once all the findings of the independent review panel are known, to be highly critical, given we already know from those that we represent that fatal harm was caused in at least one case, and many, many more were harmed."

Stohr was suspended by the hospital and has not been at work since March 2024, initially for personal reasons.

Ayton said the trust was "deeply sorry to the patients and families who came to harm or experienced care below the standards they should expect".

"This should never have happened and we are making changes so that something like this could not happen again," she said.

Stohr's legal representatives declined to comment about the new report when approached by the BBC.

Have you been affected by this story? Contact us below.

Follow Cambridgeshire news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X.