Organ scandal report savages doctor

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

The reputation of one doctor working at the world-renowned Alder Hey children's hospital was savaged in an official report.

The document said Dutch cot death expert and pathologist Professor Dick van Velzen "lied to parents," "stole records" and "falsified reports" during his time at the Liverpool's Alder hospital.

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

Van Velzen, who is currently on extended leave from the Westeinde hospital in The Hague and who was head of pathology at Alder Hey from 1988 to 1995, has been called before the General Medical Council and will never be allowed to work in the UK again.

He is also being reported to the UK's Director of Public Prosecutions.

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 report, published on Tuesday and presented to the House of Commons by Health Secretary Alan Milburn, who described the contents of the 600-page document as "grotesque," catalogued a series of practices which are described as "unethical and illegal."

Milburn told MPs: "For many years the hospital has made use of human hearts for research and training.

"The Redfern report says that there are now more than 1,600 children who would have died in infancy or childhood without the improvements in surgical techniques and care which were pioneered in Liverpool.

"But as the inquiry report makes clear, many of these heart were obtained without consent.

"According to the report, it appears that as well as over 2,000 childrens hearts, there were a large number of brain parts, eyes taken from foetuses, over 1,500 stillbirths of foetuses and, most disturbingly of all, a number of childrens' heads and bodies."

The full Redfern report and summary will also be published on the Internet at 4pm at www.rlcinquiry.org.uk.

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.

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 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 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.

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Alder Hey Children's Hospital
Department of Health

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