Phone torches used during surgery in power cut

Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) is one of the world's leading children's hospitals

Surgeons at Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) were forced to halt a spinal operation due to a power cut, with some theatre staff having to work under mobile phone torch light, according to a report.

The incident in 2023 was discovered during a recent inspection by the healthcare regulator the Care Quality Commission (CQC).

During their assessments of the trust in March, staff told inspectors there had been repeated issues with maintenance in operating theatres, meaning surgical procedures were often being delayed or cancelled.

The central London children's hospital said patient safety was its "top priority" and that it would close a part of the building if any issue put patients at risk.

The trust added battery-powered surgical lights remained on during the procedure and only surrounding theatre staff used torch light.

The inspectors' report said: "A recent power outage during a spinal surgery procedure required staff to use mobile phone torches to complete wound closure."

In addition to this incident, inspectors found that "recurrent theatre maintenance failures" at the trust were "impacting patient safety and access to timely care".

A spokesperson for the regulator said "power interruptions, incidents where emergency lighting failed due to reasons including water ingress and theatre closures due to filtration failures were confirmed by the trust".

The report noted the trust had taken "corrective actions" following the power cut incident, but found there were "ongoing issues" with the hospital building, raising concerns about the condition of operating theatres as well as equipment safety.

'Urgent attention'

A spokesperson for GOSH said: "We have a very active annual preventative maintenance programme across our estate, including in theatres but as with most hospitals, on occasion some parts of our estate need urgent attention for safety reasons."

The trust said the power cut incident happened while the site was experiencing "a series of intermittent power outages due to a design fault within the electrical system."

The trust said the overhead surgery lights remained on, but theatre staff were left in darkness.

A decision was taken to stop the operation and carry out the surgery at a later date.

The patient is "doing well", the trust added.

The assessments, carried out in October, followed a review into poor care provided by Yaser Jabbar, a former paediatric lower limb surgeon at the trust.

Mr Jabbar left the hospital in 2023 after a report by the Royal College of Surgeons (RCS) found some of the surgery had been "inappropriate" and "incorrect".

Great Ormond Street, which treats 76,000 children each year, was rated "good" overall.

Inspectors found trust as "good," but said the level of governance was "inconsistent" in some speciality areas.

Staff in several parts of the hospital were not clear about who was responsible for clinical care - a concern previously raised by a Royal College of Surgeons review - the CQC said.