Parents sue over failures in child hearing service at NHS Lothian

Sophie was born partly deaf and failed repeated hearing tests for years

More than a dozen families are seeking compensation following "significant failures" at NHS Lothian's hearing service for children.

The health board apologised to more than 155 families after an independent investigation found serious problems diagnosing and treating hearing loss.

The British Academy of Audiology looked at more than 1,000 patient records from 2009 to 2018.

NHS Lothian said it was implementing the recommendations of the review.

Sophie was born partly deaf and failed repeated hearing tests for years.

Her family say no help was offered by the paediatric audiology department at NHS Lothian who kept saying she would be fine. But her parents say she is not.

Sophie is now seven. Her speech and language has not developed fully and is sometimes hard to understand. Her confidence has been affected.

Sophie's parents Sarah and Joseph say they have lost faith in the system

Her dad Joseph said Sophie is scared to socialise and will stand alone in the playground. She does not go to parties in case the sound hurts her ears, he said.

Joseph said he has lost faith in the system. "More should've been done sooner," he said.

Her mum Sarah said: "They failed Sophie. You kind of trust what they were doing, you thought maybe she doesn't need hearing aids, maybe she will just catch up and now she's almost eight years old and she's still not caught up and you think 'OK, maybe there were mistakes made then'."

'Apologised sincerely'

An independent investigation by the British Academy of Audiology (BAA), published in December last year, found "significant failures" involving 155 children over nine years at NHS Lothian.

Several profoundly deaf children were diagnosed too late for vital implant surgery. The health board has "apologised sincerely" to those affected.

The BAA looked at more than 1,000 patient records finding "significant failures" in almost 14% of them.

The BAA said it found "no evidence" that national guidelines and protocols on hearing tests for children had been followed or consistently applied "at any point since 2009".

It also highlighted the average age of diagnosis of hearing loss at NHS Lothian was 4.5 years during this period. In England, the average age of diagnosis was 109 days.

The report said NHS Lothian staff were deviating from professional standards.

It said not enough checks were carried out, or data collected, to monitor how the service compared to other parts of the country.

Now more than a dozen families are suing the health board for compensation.

Collection of data

Senior lawyer Jonathan Howat, of Thompsons Solicitors, is representing a number of children affected.

He said: "Families I represent have been treated disgracefully by NHS Lothian, as a result of delays in identifying and treating hearing impairments, the lives of many children have been made significantly more challenging.

"Our legal action against the health board will make sure that these children and their families are properly compensated."

There are concerns the problems may extend beyond the Lothian area.

Mike Hobday, of the National Deaf Children's Society, said: "The problem of children's hearing services in Scotland is that there's no systematic collection of data.

"There's no way of knowing whether the problems in NHS Lothian are being repeated anywhere else in Scotland.

"So we've asked the Scottish government to collect data on the performance of children's hearing services across Scotland and we hope very much that that will identify whether there are other areas that have the same problems that NHS Lothian do.''

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NHS Lothian medical director Tracey Gillies said: "We continue to implement the recommendations of the review, reporting directly to Scottish government on our progress.

"Once again, we apologise sincerely to all affected children and their families for the failings identified by the review, and for the worry and distress caused."

A spokeswoman for the Scottish government said: "We share the concerns of the National Deaf Children's Society and the failings in these services by NHS Lothian was totally unacceptable.

"That's why we've recently announced that a National Audiology Review Group is being established to examine hearing services provided to both children and adults in Health Boards across Scotland and make recommendations on improvements for the service."

She said improving data collection would be a key area for improvement work.