CCNR Report and associated documents
The Bristol Royal Infirmary Inquiry announced in August 1999 its proposals to review a sample of cases taken from over 1,800 children and babies who received either open or closed heart surgery over a 12 year period in Bristol. The sample was deliberately structured towards cases of younger children and those who had open-heart surgery.
It was the first time that cases, drawn from the paediatric cardiac activity at the Bristol Royal Infirmary and Bristol Children’s Hospital between 1984 and 1995, had been so thoroughly reviewed.
Review teams, consisting of members from the Inquiry’s Expert Group, independent experts with a wide range of clinical, academic and managerial experience, looked at the adequacy of key aspects of pre-operative, surgical and post-operative care, as well as the adequacy of care overall.
The following documents are available:
- Final Clinical Case Note Review Report
- Those CCNR forms for which the Inquiry had either full or partial consent from the family or patient to publish
- Letters from the Expert Review Team Leaders
- Letters from members of the Expert Review Teams indicating how the term ‘adequacy’ was interpreted in the context of the review exercise
- Typical knowledge base of a paediatric cardiac surgeon during the period 1984-1995
Evans SJW (2000). The Use of Sample Weights in the Clinical Case Note Review
- The clinicians on the Inquiry’s Expert Group were formed into review teams, which consisted of five members:
- paediatric cardiac surgeon;
- paediatric cardiologist;
- paediatric anaesthetist/intensivist;
- paediatric pathologist; and
- paediatric nurse or intensive care nurse.
The Inquiry made extensive efforts to contact all families in the sample to ask for their views and comments and said that no information about any individual would be made public without a family’s prior permission. Parents of children whose cases formed part of the Review sample and Bristol clinicians were invited to comment on individual reviews and were give the opportunity to request repeat reviews. See Inquiry Procedures
In November 1999 the Inquiry published a Preliminary Clinical Case Note Review Report. This Preliminary Report formed the foundations for the final Report published above.