Derriford surgeon is suspended

A DECORATED military surgeon who operated on a 12-year-old boy’s genitals without consent while carrying out a hernia procedure at Derriford Hospital has been suspended for six months.

- CARL EVE 

Commander Anthony Lambert told the boy’s parents that he had done the procedure without consulting them because he was ‘a bit of a nosey t***’ and noticed it ‘didn’t look normal’.

The ‘extremely senior and respected practitioner’ – who served in the Royal Navy for 36 years and reached the rank of Surgeon Commander – had been performing an umbilical hernia repair on the child on April 20, 2016, at Derriford.

However, while the boy was unconscious under general anaesthetic, the tribunal heard he “undertook a freeing of preputial adhesions on Patient A’s penis without the knowledge or consent of either Patient A or his parents, and that his language when informing them of what he had done was inappropriate.”

Three days later, the mother of the boy submitted a complaint, stating that he had carried out the operation on the boy’s genitals without her or her husband’s knowledge or consent.

A tribunal heard that Cdr Lambert’s inappropriate comment to the boy and his mother came from his explanation as to why he carried out the procedure, namely that he had said: “…because I am a bit of a nosey t***, I noticed that [Patient A]’s penis did not look quite normal…”

The tribunal noted that, when interviewed, Cdr Lambert had said this was “the first time in 16 years I’ve had a complaint”.