Free to carry on working, surgeon who branded his initials on patients’ livers
‘Signing his artwork’
AN ARROGANT surgeon who branded his initials on to the livers of two of his patients escaped jail yesterday and will continue to practise.
Simon Bramhall, 53, left the ‘ SB’ markings as a ‘naive and foolhardy’ attempt to relieve tension in the operating theatre after the lengthy and life-saving procedures.
The surgeon left his initials on two anaesthetised victims in 2013 at Birmingham’s Queen Elizabeth Hospital.
He used an ‘argon beam coagulator’ to leave the 4cm- tall brandings on his patients who were unconscious on the operating table.
Yesterday, Bramhall, described as a ‘distinguished and highly skilled surgeon’, was fined £10,000, handed a 12-month community order and told to do 120 hours of unpaid work. He was also told to pay £1,200 in legal costs.
The court heard that when a concerned theatre nurse queried what he was up to, Bramhall told her: ‘This is what I do’.
His actions were discovered after the liver transplant of one of his victims, known as Patient A, failed for unrelated reasons and another surgeon opened the patient up and saw the markings.
That surgeon asked a colleague in theaone tre to take a picture of the branding on his BlackBerry and reported the matter to hospital executives in December that year.
The patient was informed of the assault during a check-up in January 2014 and described the discovery as being similar to finding out they were a rape victim.
Judge Paul Farrer QC, sentencing, told Bramhall his unnamed victim ‘suffered an extreme reaction’ to what happened.
He said the patient had lost trust in doctors, has regular ‘flashbacks and nightmares’ and had showed symptoms of post- traumatic stress disorder.
The patient has not been able to shake the ‘ erroneous’ belief that the failure of the liver transplant was caused by his actions.
The judge said: ‘ This was conduct born of professional arrogance of such magnitude that it strayed into criminal behaviour.
‘What you did was an abuse of power and a betrayal of trust that these patients had invested in you. I accept that you didn’t intend or foresee anything but the most trivial of harm would be caused.’ But of his patients who underwent a transplant by him more than ten years ago told the BBC he should not be punished. Kathryn Hodgson, from Grantham, Lincolnshire, compared him to an artist signing off his work.
She said: ‘ When all is said and done an artist signs his work and that’s just what he’s done.
‘Because the difficulty in the surgery and everything you have to do with it… 13 plus hours of being stood there concentrating on something. It’s just amazing, so signing his work is just his way of showing the artwork he’s done.’
Marking a liver with an argon beam coagulator would not normally be harmful and the marks usually disappear.
His other victim declined to take part in the police investigation but the branding was witnessed by Bramhall’s colleagues.
Bramhall, of Tarrington, Herefordshire, admitted two counts of assault at Birmingham Crown Court last month. Frank Ferguson, head of special crime at the CPS, said the case was ‘unique’ in British legal history.
He said the surgeon’s victims were ‘vulnerable’ because there ‘is no greater trust than the trust which a patient places in a surgeon when they are having an operation and no greater vulnerability than that of a patient who’s under general anaesthetic.
‘The breach of that trust and the abuse of that power were aggravating features that led us to conclude it was the right thing to do to take this case forward.’
The surgeon resigned from Queen Elizabeth Hospital in 2014 after feeling his position had become ‘untenable’.
He is currently working at The County Hospital in Hereford, where he is a general surgeon, and continues to practise. A spokesman for his employers Wye Valley NHS Trust said: ‘The activities which resulted in this court case took place prior to Mr Bramhall joining the Trust.
‘The General Medical Council has judged Mr Bramhall fit to practise. He does not carry out liver transplants at the Trust.’
He was given a formal warning by the GMC in February last year because his actions risked ‘bringing the profession into disrepute’.
It is understood he is now facing a second investigation by the General Medical Council, which gave him a formal warning last year.
In court, Bramhall was described as a ‘distinguished and highlyskilled surgeon’ who had ‘saved many lives’ after performing 371 liver transplants and other procedures over many years.