A two-year-old boy taken to the Bristol Royal Hospital for Children for treatment of an undescended testicle has had his life irrevocably changed; when surgeons operated on the wrong testicle, they essentially “castrated” him (by leaving him infertile). The family had been told by specialists that the procedure would be over within 30 minutes with “minimal risk”. They are obviously devastated. (The undescended testicle was discovered during a routine check-up.)
The family are remaining anonymous to protect their son’s identity.
His father said,
“We were waiting and waiting. After two-and-a-half hours the manager, surgeons and consultants came and I knew something was not right. Me and my wife started panicking, they called us into the office and told us things didn’t go right and the operation wasn’t a success.
I was very distressed, it was an awful disaster for a simple operation. They destroyed everything and they ruined my son. They castrated him and now my son’s future life has dramatically changed.”1
(It was explained to the family that a surgeon had mistakenly inserted a camera into the wrong side and so that healthy testicle would never work again.)
His mother said, “They broke my heart and they basically destroyed his future. I can’t find the words to explain how I’m feeling – there are no words. Even tears, I have no more tears. We just hope for a miracle, this is what we hope.”2
The University Hospitals Bristol NHS Foundation Trust apologized, have launched an investigation and released the following statement:
“As soon as our staff members realized what had happened, they met with the family, told them what happened, and apologized again at that point. I would like to re-iterate that we take patient safety extremely seriously here and also the quality of our clinical care. As a result, a serious incident investigation has been launched. We will keep the family informed and involved in this process.”3
Our thoughts are with the family.
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