Botched operations are putting further strain on the NHS: Dirty tools, cutting wrong body part and leaving equipment in patient among top reasons why further treatment needed

The number of patients left needing further treatment because of botched NHS operations has soared more than 70 per cent in five years.

Blunders include using dirty tools, cutting the wrong body part and leaving equipment in patients’ bodies at the end of a procedure.

Patients needed extra care as a result of 23,997 such incidents last year, up 72.6 per cent from 13,903 in 2018/19, according to NHS England.

The trauma can leave people in pain, delay recovery and place them at additional risk if procedures need to be repeated under general anaesthetic.

Repeated surgery also takes up valuable staff and operating theatre time that could be used to clear waiting lists, which currently stand at 7.6million.

Patients needed further care after surgeons accidentally cut the wrong part of their body on 19,174 occasions last year, making it the most common type of accident.

While ‘under the knife’ these patients suffered what the NHS describe as an ‘unintentional cut, puncture, perforation or haemorrhage’.

The number of occasions where doctors have treated a patient suffering from these mistakes has almost doubled in the last five years and rose 13 per cent in the last year alone.

Patients needed extra care as a result of 23,997 such incidents last year, up 72.6 per cent from 13,903 in 2018/19, according to NHS England (file image) 

Figures show the majority of these complications occur during surgery, however some occur while patients are being assessed with a flexible camera, known as an endoscopic examination.

The NHS statistics show patients are increasingly coming round from sedation to find pieces of equipment have been accidentally left inside them or they were operated on with equipment that had not been sterilised properly.

Others were not given the proper medication and suffered complications as a result.

The NHS says much of this rise is due to surgeons attempting increasingly complex operations, where the likelihood of something going wrong is greatly increased.

However, health bosses admit there is no excuse for accidentally leaving equipment in a patient and this is known formally as a ‘never event’ as it should never happen.

Despite this, there were a record 335 occasions last year when people had to be seen again by medics because an item such as a swab or a needle had not been retrieved from their body at the end of their operation.

There were 47 incidents where patients were left at risk of infection because the equipment used on them had not been sterilised properly.

And there were 132 occasions where patients were cared for in hospital after a complication arose because they were not given the proper dosage of medication.

Mr Winchester (middle-back) pictured with his daughter and two sons 

Jeremy Parker (pictured) was struck off by the MPTS in February 2023

Guy Forster, the joint vice president of the Association of Personal Injury Lawyers (APIL) said: ‘When patients put their health in the hands of the NHS, they should be able to expect not to be let down by basic avoidable failures such as non-sterile equipment or ‘never events’ such as wrong site surgery.

‘These incidents frequently have very serious, long-term consequences for the victims.

‘Despite identifying these events, lessons are not being learned and the same failures are repeated again and again.

‘The approach to patient safety within the NHS is disjointed, with a patchwork of reporting schemes, frameworks, and recommendations.

‘There is an urgent need for a co-ordinated, overarching strategy to tackle the issues which cause repeated needless injuries and deaths in the NHS.’

An NHS England spokesperson said: ‘NHS staff work very hard every day to look after patients and, while patient safety incidents like these are thankfully rare, it is vital that NHS organisations take effective steps to learn from them and improve.’

Earlier this year, a builder lost his business, his wife and his home after a botched operation left him disabled and unable to work.

Rodney Winchester, from Thetford, racked up £40,000 of debt and was thrust into poverty after disgraced NHS surgeon Jeremy Parker took out his entire knee joint during an operation.

Pictured: The Royal Sussex County Hospital in Brighton, where deaths which occurred between 2015 and 2020 are being investigated by Sussex Police

The father-of-three had an issue with loose cartilage in his knee and was told he’d need an operation to remove the broken fragments, only to later discover the operation was unnecessary and that steroid injections would have been sufficient.

In Brighton, a surgeon at an under-fire NHS trust used a Swiss Army penknife from his lunch to cut open a patient after being unable to find a sterile scalpel.

The unnamed surgeon was operating on a patient at the Royal Sussex Hospital in September when he allegedly couldn’t find a clean instrument.

So he decided to grab his penknife which he normally used to cut up his fruit for lunch instead.

University Hospitals Sussex said the operation took place outside the theatre in an emergency situation, but his actions were ‘outside normal procedures and should not have been necessary’.

Fortunately, the patient survived, but those at the hospital felt his behaviour was ‘questionable’ and were ‘very surprised’ he couldn’t find a clean scalpel.

MailOnline also revealed in September that a ‘rogue’ children’s doctor who treated 721 children at Great Ormond Street Hospital, leaving some with serious injuries, different leg lengths and even requiring amputations is continuing to operate on unsuspecting patients in Dubai.

Dr Yaser Jabbar is a former NHS orthopaedic surgeon who is alleged to have left dozens of children with life-changing injuries due to his surgeries

One of his alleged victims (pictured), who had a misalignment in his legs, had his leg amputated after Dr Jabbar allegedly botched his operation

Former NHS surgeon Yaser Jabbar, 43, stopped treating patients at the hospital in 2022, after concerns were raised about his work, before moving to the Middle East and claiming to be one of the most sought-after doctors in his field.

Now he is living in Dubai where he speaks about his ‘expertise’ at conferences and continues to operate on children at the Clemenceau Medical Center and at hospitals for orthopaedics specialists Orthocure, their websites show.

Great Ormond Street launched an urgent review of all the youngsters treated by Jabbar in its orthopaedic department after colleagues and the families of his patients complained about his conduct.

Out of just 37 children treated by Jabbar at the hospital who have already been assessed, 22 of them have come to some degree of harm with 13 classed as severe harm.

One child needed to have a leg amputated following a surgery carried out by Jabbar and another is facing the threat of amputation.

Some have been left with different length legs, in some cases by as much as 20cm, while other injuries include muscle damage and nerve injuries.