Ninety-Four Children Bear Cost of Delayed Scrutiny

A single surgeon at Great Ormond Street Hospital botched limb reconstructions on 91 children out of hundreds treated from 2017 to 2022. The hospital’s internal review labels his practice substandard, with 35 cases of severe harm including amputations and constant pain. Official apologies follow years after staff flagged risks.

Jabbar specialised in high-risk procedures: metal plates, bone grafts, implants for complex cases. Over a quarter of his surgical patients suffered harm from premature device removals, unjustified operations, incorrect bone pinning, and wrong cuts. Complications went unmanaged, turning expected risks into predictable disasters.

Concerns surfaced early. Surgeon Sarah McMahon warned management in autumn 2021 about inappropriate surgeries in a toxic environment. The hospital received seven complaints and probed one serious incident before June 2022, signing off with NHS England approval—no deeper action followed.

Whistleblowing stalled. Royal College of Surgeons reviewed at GOSH’s request only after a staff member’s June 2022 alert. GOSH then commissioned its own 2024 probe, compiling independent doctors’ findings into a self-published report.

Families reject the process. One girl’s leg amputated after multiple operations; another’s son endures pain from unconsented ankle surgery, derailing college. Both demand police probes—the Met Police now reviews for criminality.

Jabbar holds no UK licence and lives abroad. GOSH Chief Executive Matthew Shaw calls it the hospital’s bleakest day, citing hyper-specialisation with few NHS experts as detection barriers. Yet prior safeguards failed across five years.

Oversight in Specialist Silos

NHS England now probes GOSH’s handling. The trust implemented RCS recommendations post-2022: complaint training, whistleblower support, case discussions with another hospital. These fixes address symptoms, not the lag between 2021 warnings and intervention.

Hyper-specialism concentrates power. With scarce limb reconstruction surgeons, peers hesitate on critiques, and hospitals shield reputations. GOSH treated 789 children under Jabbar; 94 harmed equates to systemic tolerance of outliers.

This echoes NHS patterns. Staff concerns dismissed, self-reviews dominate, executives apologise without resignations. Accountability evaporates in prestige institutions, where child patients absorb the failures.

Governments fuel the drift. Labour and Conservative alike fund complex care without mandating external oversight for rarified fields. Outcomes stagnate: harm persists until public outcry forces reviews.

Ordinary families suffer most. Amputations scar lives; pain disrupts education and futures. Taxpayers sustain GOSH’s world-famous status, yet deliver substandard results in core missions.

Institutions prioritise survival over surgery standards. Warnings ignored for a year enabled 94 harms at a flagship hospital. Britain’s NHS declines through repeated indulgence of flawed specialists, eroding trust one child at a time.