‘Children will die’ warning is criticised by NHS chiefs in heart operations row

NHS chiefs have launched a public consultation over plans which could see an end to heart surgery at Leeds Children’s Hospital, with patients instead treated at centres in Newcastle, Liverpool or Leicester.

Leading Leeds surgeon Kevin Watterson last week warned some children would die if they faced lengthy journeys to hospitals outside the region.

Hospital managers have also claimed there were factual errors in a report into services which rated the Leeds centre 10th out of 11 in the country.

In an escalating and increasingly bitter row, officials from the National Specialised Commissioning Team, which is responsible for organising paediatric heart surgery in England, have written to hospital chiefs in Leeds rejecting their claims and even accusing the trust of making “false allegations”.

Director Teresa Moss said: “We reject allegations that have been made by Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust. We are concerned that unhelpful and incorrect allegations are being used to mislead politicians and the public.”

She said the plans drawn up “would improve outcomes for children and secure safe and sustainable services for all children in the north of England in the future”.

Plans to provide two rather than three heart surgery centres in the North followed detailed population analysis.

“The number of children needing heart surgery is not large enough in the North of England to sustain three safe children’s heart centres. Pooling surgical expertise in fewer larger centres would improve outcomes for children,” she added.

She accused the Leeds trust of making “false allegations” about the way the recommendations had been drawn up, while its own clinicians had lobbied to provide services to the whole of the North.

The review had concluded one centre would be too large for the numbers requiring surgery.

She said it was “misleading” to claim children would die if they had to travel further and “particularly misleading” given that clinicians in Leeds supported an option to transfer children from Newcastle to Leeds and for transfers from across the whole of the North.

Emergency transfer times had been considered in line with national guidelines and the review had used standards endorsed by the Paediatric Intensive Care Society which allowed for any child being collected by road within journey times of three hours, or four in remote areas.

“Detailed travel time analysis has been carried out so that all the options that are being consulted on are viable and ensure safe retrieval times,” she added.

She also denied accusations by hospital managers in Leeds that they had not been given an opportunity to comment on draft assessment findings.

A Leeds trust spokesman said: “The trust will be looking at the letter and responding as appropriate in due course. We do not feel commenting further in public would be helpful at this stage.”