Eight-year-old Aoife Scott
AN ENNISKILLEN mother has accused the Health Board of refusing to fund a surgical procedure that would rebuild her eight-year-old daughter’s ear despite being assured the life-altering operation would go ahead.
Aoibhinn Scott claims the Northern Ireland Health Board is “putting up barriers” by “refusing to sign papers” that would allow her daughter Aoife, who was born without an external ear and ear canal, to undergo surgery at London’s Great Ormond Street Hospital.
However, this has been denied by the board who say there “has been no refusal to make an onward referral” to the hospital.
In 2007, the family were referred to Birmingham’s Children’s Hospital for an appointment with a plastic surgeon as an ear rebuild could not be carried out in any of the North’s hospitals.
This surgery was to take place when the primary school pupil turned nine. However, after the plastic surgeon left the UK, Aoife’s case was referred to the London hospital.
This is when the problems started for the family with Mrs Scott claiming the health board are now “reluctant to grant funding”.
“It’s strange because they did grant funding for Aoife to meet the surgeon and discuss the procedure with her and we feel this is like giving a child a bag of sweets and telling them that they can’t eat them,” she said.
“As it’s a different hospital our consultant in Northern Ireland has not referred us to London and now the board does not want to stand over it and pay for it.
“We have hit a brick wall and there’s nothing more we can do. It’s like the board are putting up these barriers and I can’t get past them because no one here will sign the surgery form.
“We have been told by the surgeon in London that he can do the surgery in the next six months. If we get that appointment soon, I will have to cancel as we don’t have the funding for it. She’s met the surgeon and seen what he can do. How do we tell her that no one is going to pay for it.”
The estimate cost of the surgical procedure is £30,000 and would involve taking cartilage from Aoife’s ribs, moulding it in to the same shape as her other ear and placing it under a pocket of skin. After six months, Aoife would undergo a skin graft procedure.
A spokesman for the Belfast Trust refuted Mrs Scott’s claims saying: “With any surgical procedure an up-to-date pre operative consultation is required to ensure that the patient is fit for surgery, particularly if they have not been seen by the consultant for several years.
“The patient’s GP would contact the hospital to make the appropriate arrangements, and as soon as this happens we will be in a position to move things forward as quickly as possible.”
A previous consultant told the Scott family that the best age for this procedure is nine, before a child starts secondary school.
Mrs Scott is now concerned they could be forced to wait another number of years before the procedure could take place.
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