Grieving widow hits out over surgery carried out on her husband - The Redditch Standard

Grieving widow hits out over surgery carried out on her husband

Redditch Editorial 26th Mar, 2018   0

A GRIEVING widow has described surgery carried out on her husband as ‘brutal’.

Steve Bridgman from Redditch was admitted to the Walsgrave Hospital in Coventry with a benign brain tumour.

He was operated on by consultant neurosurgeon Hussien El-Maghraby but the surgery left the Southcrest man in a vegetative state after his brain was left damaged following heavy bleeding.

An expert in neurosurgery later described a video clip of Mr El-Maghraby’s operation on Steve as ‘rough surgery’ and said he was appalled by what he saw.




The case was highlighted by the BBC programme Inside Out which also revealed that Mr El-Maghraby had in one operation removed a healthy part of the brain of a patient instead of a tumour.

Following complaints, including from a whistleblower, the Royal College of Surgeons carried out an inspection of Mr El-Maghraby’s technique but, apart from stopping him performing two types of surgical procedure, ruled no further action was necessary.


“It’s unbelievable,” said Steve’s widow, Mandy, a former nurse at the Alexandra Hospital.

“I’ve stopped crying so much. I’m just so angry about everything that has happened.”

The BBC quoted Chris Adams, the former head of neurological surgery at the former Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford as saying: “This is very, very rough surgery. In fact I’m appalled by it frankly.

“I have never seen this sort of tumour removed in this way – [it has] just been pulled out in one piece.

“It’s just completely contrary to how one does neurosurgery.”

Steve’s operation was on September 13, 2016, and came after he had collapsed at his Redditch home.

He was taken to Worcestershire Royal Hospital where he was referred to the Walsgrave with a benign brain tumour.

Following surgery, Mandy was so concerned at how the operation had gone she requested Steve’s medical notes which included a 20 minute video clip of parts of the operation.

“This is supposed to be delicate surgery but the video clip is just horrendous,” she said.

Professor Andrew Hardy, chief executive officer at University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire NHS Trust, said: “Our priority as an organisation is to provide safe, high quality healthcare for our patients.

“Consistent with our priorities relating to safety and quality, we acted swiftly as soon as concerns were raised about Mr El-Maghraby’s clinical practice. To ensure objectivity as well as the required level of technical expertise, we commissioned two independent clinical reviews of the work of Mr El-Maghraby in 2014 and 2017.

“Each of these reviews was undertaken by leading experts in the field of neurosurgery. In 2014, two clinical cases were reviewed in depth by a national neurosurgical expert and no surgical concerns were raised.

“A more recent review in 2017 by the Royal College of Surgeons and their report was received by UHCW during January 2018 and this is going through our internal quality processes before we publish a summary of the findings.

“An interim letter received following the RCS visit recommended that Mr El Maghraby was safe to continue with the majority of his surgical work although it recommended that he should not carry out two very specialist types of surgery pending further training and mentorship.

“The Trust has no concerns about the safety of the neurosurgery department as a whole and is committed to continuous improvement.”

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