It is emerging that an NHS surgeon who was sacked after accidentally setting a patient on fire during an operation has won a race and unfair dismissal claim and had been awarded almost £65,000 costs. Obi Iwuchukwu who is 57 is a breast specialist and was suspended after a woman suffered major burns during an operated on her in August 2013.
After an investigation was launched, it was told that Mr Iwuchukwu had used an alcoholic antiseptic on the patient and that it had ignited like a ‘flash of lightning’ when he attempted to use a heated surgical tool to sterilise wounds. UNN’s Oliver Down understands that the employment tribunal was told that all the staff involved in the incident at the South Tyneside and Sunderland NHS Trust hospital received counselling.
Following the investigation Mr Iwuchukwu was eventually sacked after further concerns came to light regarding his performance. However, after a lengthy legal battle the surgeon has won compensation after a judge ruled in his favour that he had been unfairly dismissed and racially discriminated against by the South Tyneside and Sunderland NHS Trust.
However, he was seeking £5million in damages but was awarded £56,000. The latest tribunal has been told that Mr Iwuchukwu had a number of run-ins with colleagues. This included an incident in which he clashed with a German colleague who had told him ‘we are not operating out of a hut in Congo’. To this Mr Iwuchukwu replied that Britain is ‘not like Nazi Germany’.
The tribunal panel was told: ‘During the operation, he was handed an alcohol, rather than an aqueous, based antiseptic solution which he applied to the patient. He then used a diathermy pen which targets electrically induced heat to stop the wound from bleeding. It ignited the alcohol preparation and the patient suffered a major burn. It was described in the subsequent investigation as though a flash of lightning had entered the theatre. All staff were given counselling’.
Judge Andrew Buchanan said at the recent tribunal that the sacking was a ‘knee-jerk’. He also said: ‘No analysis was carried out of the extent of [Mr Iwuchukwu’s] practice which was giving rise to concern and no consideration was given to anything other than a blanket exclusion. Everything points to the exclusion…being a knee-jerk reaction to the serious incident on 13 August 2013 on the assumption that the claimant was responsible for it but it became clear by early November 2013, at the latest, that [it] was not the fault of [Mr Iwuchukwu]’.
Current Affairs Correspondent | My name is Oliver Down I am 22, and a staunch brexiteer. I am a Bristolian lad who studied politics in Leicester. I believe in free speech and accurate journalism and I won’t be afraid to give you “the other side” of the story!
[sibwp_form id=4]
