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Surgeon is suspended after back operation woman dies
Anna Davis12 Mar 2009
A London surgeon has been suspended after a fit and healthy mother died following a back operation.
Chinh Nguyen, 45, performed the surgery, which was expected to take 45 minutes, on 55-year-old Satwant Vohra at the private Garden Hospital in Hendon.
During the surgery Mrs Vohra's aorta - the main artery taking blood from the heart-was pierced. Mr Nguyen did not detect the problem and is believed to have gone home.
Mrs Vohra's condition deteriorated and she was taken to the NHS-run Whittington Hospital in Archway for emergency surgery.
The late-night procedure appeared to be a success and Mr Nguyen, who had been called to the hospital, told Mrs Vohra's family she was out of danger and they could go home. But her aorta ruptured at 5am and she died three hours later.
An inquiry has begun after it emerged that another north London hospital suspended Mr Nguyen a year before Mrs Vohra's operation to relieve her pain from a trapped nerve on 3 December. Mr Nguyen had been cleared to work a few months previously.
Mr Nguyen was investigated at Whittington Hospital after three patients nearly died following the same type of surgery.
The Vietnamese doctor came to Britain aged 18 and studied medicine at University College London before qualifying in 1993. He became a consultant orthopaedic surgeon in 2005.
He has been suspended from Garden Hospital, Whittington hospital and Highgate Hospital, another private institution.
Mrs Vohra's husband, Baljit, 59, who runs the post office in Welwyn, Hertfordshire, said: "We are just devastated. I have lost a darling wife. It was completely unexpected. My wife was healthy apart from a bad back. After seeing a lot of people about it we saw Mr Nguyen who had advised surgery. He said it was a simple procedure."
Mr Vohra said he waited on the evening of the operation with his two grown up children at the Garden Hospital. But at 10pm, three hours after the operation was supposed to have finished, the hospital manager told Mr Vohra there was a problem.
An inquest into Mrs Vohra's death is due to be held in May.
A source at the Garden Hospital, which is run by BMI Healthcare, said Whittington Hospital did not officially inform it of Mr Nguyen's previous suspension.
