‘I ‘d like to ask him why he was happy to butcher me?’
The first Scots victim of butcher surgeon Ian Paterson has told how she was mutilated in an unnecessary op.
Susan Mcgougan, 64, who lives in Garlieston, Dumfries and Galloway, said: “I want to see him face-to-face. I want to ask him, ‘Why? Why me? Why the other women?’ I want to ask him why he was happy to risk my life just so that he could get a fancy suit or an expensive car. What made him do it? Its unbelievable to think that he would put me and so many others through this.”
Paterson operated on Mcgougan in 2004 in Solihull in the Midlands. It would be years before she found out that her surgery had not been needed at all.
She said: “It happened while we were living in Birmingham as my husband worked there. At the time, it was terrifying. I had two young girls and I thought I had a lump in my left breast. I’d had one before but it was benign. So I went along and saw Paterson and he said, ‘That looks suspicious
“He said it needed to come out. I had to put on a brave face for the kids. After the operation, they said everything was fine.
“Years later, I was told he had never held a meeting with the anaesthetists or nursing staff. It all went under the radar – he claimed cash for a bigger operation than it actually was.
“Even the consent form I signed was illegal. The lawyer has a five-page report saying everything he did was totally wrong and there was no lump.
“There is a picture of the mammogram he took in there and it was just some fatty tissue and it did not require an operation.
“When I look at the deformity I have to live with, it brings it all back. He has butchered me. Since then, it has been a case of buying a bra that fits one breast and stuffing the other side with tissue and wearing baggy tops.”
Paterson’s crimes rank among a number of women’s health scandals to raise questions about entrenched sexism in healthcare. Other scandals affecting women include maternity care failures and the widespread use of flawed pelvic mesh implants.
UK ministers have promised to address “decades of gender health inequality” under a forthcoming Women’s Health Strategy.
Mcgougan said: “I could have died on that operating table. I am not alone. I know there are thousands that have been affected. We moved to Scotland nine years ago and I was here when I got the call about Paterson. Anyone who has been affected should come forward.”