Accused surgeon resigns post at Wolverhampton hospital

Ian Wilson had been working at New Cross Hospital, Wolverhampton, on a week-by-week locum basis.

He faced being struck off for allegedly falsifying results at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham, but recently survived a General Medical Council investigation.

After leaving the QE, Mr Wilson had been working at New Cross on a voluntary basis under supervision and was recently praised for his 'high quality' work.

He was also severely criticised by a coroner over the deaths of three patients.

The inquest into the deaths of the three men operated on by the consultant cardiothoracic surgeon found that there were 'missed opportunities' to identify problems at an earlier stage and that the surgery had been 'more extensive than necessary'.

Mr Wilson was found by the Birmingham coroner to have deviated from accepted surgical practice during the operations on Peter Brookes, aged 72, of Halesowen; Alan Tringham, 78, of Hereford; and Alan Lucas, 77, of Solihull.

The three men were among at least 15 patients who died between September 2011 and September 2012 after being operated on by Mr Wilson at University Hospitals Birmingham Trust (UHB), which runs the QE.

Mr Wilson was sacked from his position after it was found that he may have been fiddling surgery results for up to 10 years.

It was alleged that he changed information to make his results appear better than they were on a database designed to allow patients to compare the success rates of surgeons.

At a four-day inquest into the three deaths, coroner for Birmingham and Solihull, Louise Hunt, concluded that an operation on Mr Brookes was 'more extensive then necessary' – leading to extra time in theatre and causing more harm.

Mrs Hunt said this triggered low blood pressure and a cardiac arrest which caused brain damage. Mr Brookes then suffered further cardiac arrests in intensive care following surgery.

She made identical comments in recording narrative verdicts into the deaths of Alan Tringham, who had surgery in June 2012, and Alan Lucas, whose operation was in April 2012.

UHB's internal investigation found Mr Wilson under reported the length of time that 500 patients were on bypass by a total of 329 hours or 13.7 days.

His patients were also recorded as much more likely to have other conditions, which would have made their surgery riskier and more complicated.

Earlier this month bosses at New Cross defended Mr Wilson with chief executive David Loughton saying patients should be 'reassured' about the accuracy of surgical data at the trust.

He also added: "Patients should be reassured about the accuracy of cardiac surgical data coming out of the Wolverhampton cardiothoracic surgical unit as 100 per cent of this data undergoes internal validation by the audit department prior to submission to the Society for Cardiothoracic Surgery."

UHB alleged that Mr Wilson had shortened the length of time his patients were recorded as on heart-lung bypass to give the impression that his operations were going more smoothly than they were.