The surgeon heading up the Eljamel clinical review faces questions over why it took him 10 months to realise private patient files had been sent to him in error.
Professor Stephen Wigmore was sent a spreadsheet by NHS Tayside on February 27 last year with names and addresses of Sam Eljamel’s victims.
The files also contained details of patients’ operations at the hands of the disgraced neurosurgeon, who worked in Dundee between 1995 and 2013.
The patient records were handed to Mr Wigmore two days before his appointment to lead the upcoming clinical review was even made public.
On Monday we revealed NHS Tayside had apologised to 132 Eljamel victims who were affected.
The leak was only flagged by a staff member on December 20 last year.
Mr Wigmore destroyed the spreadsheet on January 3, three days after he was notified.
On January 22 he then destroyed a second, anonymised version which had also been sent to him in error.
But patients want to know why Mr Wigmore did not delete the confidential files immediately.
What has the clinical review boss said?
Mr Wigmore told The Courier he did not request the private patient records.
Instead, he wanted details about how many patients had complained about disgraced surgeon Eljamel and how many operations he carried out.
He said: “The data that was sent to me was neither requested nor required.
“I had asked for high level data on the numbers of patients treated by Eljamel, numbers who had lodged a complaint with NHS Tayside and so forth.
“I believe the data were sent to me in good faith by someone trying to assist the purposes of the independent clinical review.
“The data has not been seen or shared with anyone else and was deleted.”
Mr Wigmore said he has also sent any relevant details concerning the breach to the Information Commissioner.
How are Eljamel’s victims reacting?
Campaigners harmed by disgraced Eljamel are furious at the latest leak.
Jules Rose, from Kinross, said this is the third time health board bosses mistakenly shared her personal data.
She wants to know why Mr Wigmore held onto the documents for so long before finally getting rid of them.
She told The Courier: “It is alarming that data was held onto for so long and not deleted.
“Patients are perplexed as to why this was the case.”
What has NHS Tayside said?
Margaret Dunning, NHS Tayside’s board secretary, apologised in a letter seen by The Courier.
“NHS Tayside sincerely apologises to you for this breach and would like to assure you that we take the security of your personal data very seriously,” she wrote.
The health board recently instigated an internal review following a similar blunder which impacted more than 100 patients.
The Courier recently catalogued a litany of data breaches NHS Tayside has had to apologise for in the past two years.
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