‘Rogue’ surgeon with more than 200 victims to face public inquiry

A surgeon who removed a woman’s tear duct instead of a brain tumour is to face a public inquiry.

Hundreds of people have come forward, including Jules Rose who has led a campaign by patients alleged to have been harmed by Sam Eljamel.

Ms Rose, a mother-of-two, previously accused NHS Tayside of ‘reaching the threshold of criminality’ while Eljamel was ‘armed with a scalpel’.

Eljamel was head of neurosurgery at NHS Tayside’s Ninewells Hospital in Dundee from 1995 until his suspension in December 2013.

Over this 18-year period he is alleged to have botched hundreds of operations, leaving some patients with life-changing injuries.

Following his suspension, Eljamel resigned in May 2014 and removed himself from the General Medical Register the following year.

Now the disgraced surgeon’s victims will give evidence against him.

The inquiry into Eljamel’s professional practice was announced by the Scottish Government in September 2023 and its terms of reference were set out by Scottish Health Secretary Neil Gray earlier this year.

Its remit includes how concerns about Eljamel were responded to by his employer, NHS Tayside, and whether the systems in place to protect patients were adequate.

Jamie Dawson KC, senior counsel to the inquiry, and Joanna Cherry KC, for the patient group, will make opening statements at a hearing in Edinburgh on Wednesday, as will Una Doherty KC for NHS Tayside and Laura Thomson KC for Scottish ministers.

On Thursday, the inquiry will hear statements on behalf of Healthcare Improvement Scotland, NHS Education for Scotland and the Royal College of Surgeons (Edinburgh).

The inquiry will also hear a submission on behalf of the Independent Clinical Review (ICR), which is not a core participant.

It will look at areas including the broad trajectory of Eljamel’s career in Scotland, the types of work he undertook and the systems surrounding his NHS practice.

It will also examine the circumstances surrounding his appointment to the role of consultant neurosurgeon at Ninewells Hospital in Dundee in 1995, and other key roles and the complaints and feedback systems in place at NHS Tayside.

Speaking to reporters outside Tayside Police Station in Dundee in November 2023, when Eljamel was understood to be working as a surgeon in Libya, Ms Rose said she believed the health board failed Eljamel’s patients.

‘NHS Tayside, we feel, armed Eljamel with a scalpel and allowed him to do business and to cause harm,’ she said.

She also previously said: ‘I currently have 133 patient names who have approached me who have been severely harmed.

‘Of these 111 new patients, I only know five. So potentially, now, we’re looking at 239 patients that have been severely harmed under NHS Tayside and Professor Eljamel. Literally, this number has increased overnight.’

In September this year NHS Tayside apologized for the way in which it handled patients’ concerns over Eljamel.

Dr James Cotton, executive medical director of NHS Tayside, said: ‘We know that many people have experienced considerable distress as patients of Mr Eljamel and we understand that in many cases we have added to that trauma in the way that we have handled ongoing complaints and concerns.’

He said the board is ‘sincerely sorry for this’, adding that it is ‘fully committed to making improvements where failings have been identified’.

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