Leeds paediatric cardiac care was safe but not compassionate, report says

The families of 16 children born with serious heart defects did not receive the compassion and support they deserved from Leeds General Infirmary, a review commissioned by NHS England has found.1

In stories described by NHS England deputy medical director Mike Bewick as “harrowing,” parents said they felt pressured to have terminations, were treated coldly and without empathy, and in some cases were not told that their children’s treatment was merely palliative.

But children’s cardiac surgery services, which were suspended briefly in March 2013 after concerns were raised about mortality figures, are safe, a second strand of the review has concluded. An independent examination of 35 deaths between 2009 …