JR cardiac inquiry should be a source of reassurance (From Oxford Mail)

JR cardiac inquiry should be a source of reassurance

6:10am Friday 5th March 2010 in

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SURGEONS and doctors are occasionally accused of being too blinded by their own arrogance and belief in their innate skill to admit if there are problems affecting their patients.

Therefore it is reassuring to learn that it was the two surgeons at the John Radcliffe Hospital, Prof Stephen Westaby and Caner Salih, who brought to officials’ attention the deaths of four babies during or soon after cardiac surgery.

There are four grieving families and many others who will be extremely worried by these deaths.

These are absolute tragedies.

Yesterday, details — the ones being made public, anyway — were too sparse to draw many firm conclusions.

They were extremely sick youngsters whose lives were at risk.

It would be too easy to automatically assume something has gone horribly wrong in their treatment.

At least, with the issue being brought to light by the surgeons rather than anyone else, it would appear the deaths will be thoroughly investigated and we shall eventually discover if this was just a statistical anomaly.

The parents of the victims and of those who need to have ongoing treatment deserve nothing less.