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Dundee

Former Dundee DJ Pat Kelly on harrowing moment he was told to say goodbye to wife and son after Eljamel surgery

Former Dundee DJ and broadcaster Pat Kelly, a victim of rogue NHS Tayside surgeon Sam Eljamel, has spoken about his fight for justice.
Graeme Strachan
Pat Kelly was a relentless campaigner for a public inquiry into Eljamel's time in Dundee. Image: Kim Cessford/DC Thomson.
Pat Kelly was a relentless campaigner for a public inquiry into Eljamel's time in Dundee. Image: Kim Cessford/DC Thomson.

Pat Kelly is one of the victims of rogue NHS Tayside surgeon Sam Eljamel and will never forget the moment he feared it was all over.

“I nearly died in 2007, a few days after my surgery, when I began to haemorrhage profusely when the wound opened after a collapsed lung,” he said.

“I was given blood transfusions and told by a doctor that I should say goodbye to my wife and son because if the blood went into my lungs I was not going to see out the night.

“Can you imagine being told this?”

Speaking eight years on from when he blew the whistle on the rogue surgeon, Mr Kelly has to steady himself at the thought of how close he came to dying.

‘I will lose five years off my life’

The former Radio Tay DJ, now 63, had gone under the knife for major back surgery in 2007 at Ninewells Hospital.

It quickly became the stuff of nightmares.

“The sadness is, no surgeon can now operate on my spine,” he said.

“I have been told by a consultant neurosurgeon that due to my continued deconditioning I will lose five years off my life.

“This is what happens when a surgeon decides to play God with you.”

In Sam Eljamel, he believed he was getting the best surgeon in the UK, a doctor who was internationally-renowned and lauded for his work in spinal and brain surgery.

Professor Sam Eljamel
Eljamel was world-renowned during his Ninewells Hospital days. Image: DC Thomson.

“I bought into the hype about just how good he was,” he said.

“I suppose, looking back, you would need to have a bit of sparkle about you doing the sort of dangerous work he was carrying out.

“How little did I know.

“All I did was to go into a theatre for an operation to improve my quality of life.

“All my family and I have been left with is a living nightmare that will never go away.

“The physical and mental price my family and I have paid is very real.”

He continued to suffer chronic discomfort following surgery, which left him with walking difficulties and reliant on a cocktail of pain relief drugs to get through the day.

Mr Kelly still trusted Eljamel despite what happened and put the complications down to an unfortunate – but not negligent – result of the surgery on his spinal disc.

“However, when I met him in 2012, at a private consultation he had changed,” he said.

“He actually looked mad. At the consultation he was really hurting me with the tests he was carrying out on my back and spine.

“Honestly, I could hardly walk after this consultation but thought perhaps he had to do this to see just how bad my mobility was.”

Pat Kelly’s fight for answers started in 2015

Eljamel botched dozens of operations and left patients with lifelong injuries between 1995 and 2013 while working in Dundee’s Ninewells Hospital as a neurosurgeon.

Mr Kelly was forced into early retirement, at the age of 54, in 2013.

Everything changed when Eljamel was given an interim order by the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service in 2014, after being suspended from Ninewells Hospital when a patient underwent surgery on the wrong spinal disc.

Pat Kelly, in his gardena and using a cane, has been speaking about his fight for justice. Image: Kim Cessford/DC Thomson.
Pat Kelly has been speaking about Sam Eljamel and his fight for justice. Image: Kim Cessford/DC Thomson.

“Complications happen sometimes but I knew a surgeon could not be suspended for making a mistake and suspected there was more to the story,” said Mr Kelly.

“My health was getting worse every day. I decided to write to NHS Tayside for more information.

“They wrote back to me claiming that Eljamel was suspended so effectively no more could be done but I was having none of it and demanded a full medical review.”

He was given an MRI scan in 2014 that showed his discs were in exactly the same position as they were pre-op — so did surgery actually take place?

“It was clear no surgery had taken place on my spine in 2007 and five consultant neurosurgeons all had the same opinion — which really shocked me,” said Mr Kelly.

“There was no way I was l letting this go and so began my long journey to get justice.”

The Courier broke the story in March 2015 when Mr Kelly went public and called for a public inquiry after claiming he was the victim of a “botched operation” by Eljamel.

The floodgates opened after Pat Kelly went public against Eljamel in 2015. Image: Kim Cessford/DC Thomson.
The floodgates opened after Pat Kelly went public against Eljamel in 2015. Image: Kim Cessford/DC Thomson.

Mr Kelly said: “In the early days it was really hard because I was making a very serious allegation against an eminent surgeon who was extremely powerful.

“I have to admit I was waiting on his or NHS Tayside’s lawyers telling me to desist with these allegations.

“When this never happened I knew then I was on the right track and to keep going.

“After this the floodgates opened and others came forward. I felt totally vindicated.”

Mr Kelly set up a Facebook page for Eljamel victims and was a constant thorn in the side of NHS Tayside and the Scottish Government as he fought tirelessly for answers.

Eljamel was travelling the world giving medical talks while suspended in the UK.

New Facebook accounts would appear and disappear just as quickly while his name would be shortened or amended for some of his lucrative speaking engagements.

Sleepless nights and ‘very dark places’ as Pat Kelly pursued Sam Eljamel

Mr Kelly spent sleepless nights tracking Eljamel’s next pay-day while researching his background and exposing the lies which boosted his CV.

“The research took me to some very dark places,” said Mr Kelly.

“I soon discovered there was more to this man than meets the eye.

“Research was the key and I spent hours on the internet gathering every bit of information I could find.

“It was tough going as the barriers soon came up to protect him.”

In February 2018, we revealed Eljamel had left Tayside for good and police started to quiz the patients and appeared to be working to build a criminal case.

He was also the subject of civil cases in relation to surgery carried out, which spent years going through the Court of Session in Edinburgh – with Eljamel nowhere to be seen.

Campaigners had been fighting for a full public inquiry for more than eight years when the Scottish Government finally relented to the demands at the start of September.

It followed a bombshell report which uncovered severe failings by NHS Tayside.

Eljamel campaigners outside Holyrood demanding a public inquiry. Image: Duncan McGlynn.
Eljamel campaigners outside Holyrood demanding a public inquiry. Image: Duncan McGlynn.

None of which came as a surprise to Mr Kelly. But he’s still angry that it took eight years to agree to an inquiry.

Mr Kelly said: “I first asked the then-Health Minister, Shona Robison, for a public inquiry back in 2015.

“Again, doctors’ reputations were obviously more important to her than patient safety.

“I just think they wanted me to go away but that was never going to happen.

“It is so important that this should never happen again.

“NHS managers should be regulated and held to account.

“Others in that theatre with Eljamel knew what he was doing but kept quiet.

“They are as bad as him, in my eyes.

“Now is the time for them to come forward.

“Who knows where this public inquiry will take us – but my real hope is that the people who were involved, from the top to the bottom, will be held to account.”

NHS Tayside has apologised to Eljamel’s former patients and said it remains “committed to do whatever is required to support all independent processes which are being set up by Scottish Government to respond to patients’ ongoing concerns”.

Handout images of Eljamel in promotional materials for his work in the Middle East. Image: Supplied.
Handout images of Eljamel in promotional materials for his work in the Middle East. Image: Supplied.

Eljamel is now believed to be operating in Libya after fleeing Scotland, although a public inquiry is unlikely to be able to compel him to attend and face questions.

Dundee detectives have been probing the rogue doctor’s butchery for nearly five years but they fear he will never be extradited to Scotland to account for his behaviour.

“But he should be there,” said Mr Kelly.

“If I ever met Eljamel again, I would just ask him why.

“Why did you do this to me?”

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