Sacked surgeon threatens to sue States

Friday 15 July 2016

An eye surgeon who claims Jersey’s hospital sacked him before he even started his job because he raised concerns over patient safety is threatening to sue the States.

Dr Amar Alwitry – who was born in the Island but later moved to England to advance his career – had been offered a post at the General Hospital as a consultant in ophthalmology and was due to start work on December 1 2012, but just a week before taking up the job was told his contract had been terminated.

An initial States Employment Board (SEB) investigation upheld the hospital’s action. But a damming report two weeks ago by the independent States of Jersey Complaints Board (SCB) came out in favour of the doctor. That’s led to a war of words, with the SEB and the Health minister refusing to admit they’ve done anything wrong, and criticising the SCB for going beyond its terms of reference.

Since then the row has rumbled on. The SCB issuing another press release – which it said was unprecedented – sticking by its findings; and the Health minister – this time in the States – still saying the department had done nothing wrong. Now Dr Alwitry’s lawyers have waded in.

Advocate Steven Chiddicks of Sinels believes, “...the statements made by the SEB and the Minister following publication of the SCB’s report are striking in their abject failure to appreciate the multitude of fundamental errors made and the catastrophic consequences which those errors have had for Dr Alwitry. The instinctive desire of the SEB and Minister to circle the wagons in order to protect views, which the SCB have quite clearly described as being views to which no reasonable person could have come, is astonishing.”

At the heart of the dispute between the hospital administration and Dr Alwitry is how genuine his concerns were for patient safety, and how valid. The hospital believe there is no need to be worried, and that Dr Alwitry simply didn’t want to work on a Saturday because he wanted to be with his family. Dr Alwitry believed there wasn’t enough back-up staff to care for patients if they developed complications after surgery.

According to Advocate Chiddicks, “Dr Alwitry is astonished by the SEB and Minister’s continuing assertion that any patient safety concerns were only raised in order to avoid working on a Saturday. As the SCB recognizes in its report, the irony is that Dr Alwitry actually offered to work on Saturdays in order to counteract the risks to patient safety which arose as a result of hospital management’s timetabling of surgery.”

Dr Alwitry still has patient safety concerns and is calling for the hospital administration to present detailed proposals for combatting what he calls the systemic, institutional problems identified by the SCB. He also wants an apology and compensation. If he doesn’t get that his lawyers say he will have no alternative but to pursue legal proceedings.