Organ scandal report published

LONDON, England -- The full extent of a scandal, involving the secret removal and stockpiling of children's organs at a British hospital, is being revealed with the publication of official report.

UK Health Secretary Alan Milburn, who was shown the report before publication of the 600-page document on Alder Hey Children's Hospital, called it "grotesque."

Officials are said to be preparing for a huge outburst of anger as parents find out for the first time exactly what happened at the hospital, in the northern city of Liverpool.

The independent inquiry was ordered after it emerged that organs from thousands of dead children were removed and retained.

Many bereaved families, who discovered their children were buried without hearts, lungs, brains and other body parts, claim they never gave informed consent to hospital doctors or pathologists.

The inquiry team, chaired by Michael Redfern QC, started to hear evidence behind closed doors last spring and presented its findings to the Department of Health in the autumn.

The role of Dutch cot death expert and pathologist Professor Dick van Velzen and hospital management who oversaw his work is believed to be at the centre of the inquiry.

The professor, who is currently on extended leave from the Westeinde hospital in The Hague, was head of pathology at Alder Hey from 1988 to 1995.

The existence of Alder Hey's heart collection -- described as "probably the biggest and the best" -- first emerged in September 1999 during the public inquiry into the deaths of babies at Bristol Royal Infirmary.

A month later, after hundreds of telephone calls from concerned parents, the Liverpool hospital admitted that other organs, including brains, lungs, kidneys and livers, had been stockpiled in a basement laboratory.

The Redfern report was published under parliamentary privilege.

Its release coincides with the publication of a report by chief medical officer Professor Liam Donaldson into the issue of informed consent and the retention of organs across the country.

The report is expected to reveal that body parts were stored for teaching and research at hospitals all over Britain.

Speaking on the eve of the publication of the two reports, Milburn said fundamental changes in the laws governing patients' consent to operations and organ donation were needed to restore the public's trust in the health service.

Addressing a conference in London, he hinted at sweeping changes in practice and policy to ensure patients gave informed consent to treatment.

"The days have gone where the NHS could act as a secret society. It cannot operate behind closed doors," Milburn said.

"It cannot keep patients in the dark. It has to take patients into its confidence. It has to actively earn the trust of patients in life and it has to actively seek the consent of relatives in death."

The health secretary said that better reporting systems of mistakes were being implemented in a bid to avoid a repeat of the damaging Alder Hey and Bristol scandals.

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Alder Hey Children's Hospital
Department of Health

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