Durham Trust Sets a Five-Year Wait After Needless Mastectomies

County Durham and Darlington NHS Foundation Trust will review up to 4,500 more breast cancer cases after confirming 20 unnecessary mastectomies. On 24 September 2026 its board voted to work backwards one year at a time toward 2015, a pace of about 80 reviews a month that could leave 2015 patients waiting until 2031.

Chief nurse Gill Hunt told the extraordinary meeting that 321 of 538 reviewed patients had been harmed, including one death. The North East and North Cumbria Integrated Care Board had asked for the full 2015 window to open at once.

The Board Chose a Five-Year Calendar

The vote at Prospect House in Durham was unanimous. Members of the Pink Justice Network, an online group of about 150 women treated by the trust, sat in the room while chair Alison Marshall apologised again.

“I would like to offer a sincere apology to all the women and their families who have been affected by the failings in our breast services,” Marshall said. “I can’t imagine the impact that has had.”

The look-back already covers care from January 2023 to February 2025, plus people who rang a dedicated helpline. Hunt said the next step is to finish that work, then start on 2022 and move back a year at a time, with a fresh decision after each year’s findings.

Chief executive Steve Russell, appointed in 2025, put the choice in plainer words. “Today’s decision means we will look further back, one year at a time,” he said. “We will carefully consider what we find at each stage before deciding what happens next.”

Board papers had set out four options, from leaving the 2023 to 2025 window as it stood to opening every file back to 2015 immediately. The trust’s own leadership team had backed the slower path, 15 of 16, in July. The Integrated Care Board wrote on 10 September 2026 to prefer the widest option.

Russell also told the meeting a fact the vote cannot change. “Patients were failed by us and no decision or ruling can ever change that.”

Later that day the trust posted a public reassurance: extending the look-back does not mean there was a problem with every woman’s care, and anyone whose file needs a further review will be contacted directly.

We know today’s decision about the breast services look-back may cause worry for some women and families.

To reassure patients, extending the look-back does not mean there was a problem with your care.

Anyone whose care needs further review will be contacted directly. pic.twitter.com/MT2F7EHgK7

— County Durham and Darlington NHS Foundation Trust (@CDDFTNHS) September 24, 2026

Twenty Mastectomies the Trust Now Says Were Not Needed

The figure that broke through is the one that cannot be reversed. The trust has confirmed that 20 women had mastectomies they did not need, inside a wider group of 32 cases of excessive surgery.

One of those women, named only as Jo, described the moment on Radio 4’s Today programme. She said further screening and biopsies would have shown that other areas were benign, and that a very small cancer in a large breast did not require a mastectomy at all.

The fact that this part of your body is now gone, and you know part of what makes you a woman’s gone. It just makes you not your whole self, really. To find out that that wasn’t necessary is absolutely horrendous.

Jo, patient, on Radio 4’s Today programme

The same unit also missed cancers. Hunt told the board the repeating themes were treatment not aligned to best practice, excessive surgery, and delayed diagnosis, which in some cases let disease spread. Those are opposite errors in one service: too much cutting, and not enough finding.

NICE guidance on early breast cancer is built around triple assessment (clinic, imaging and biopsy) and a full multidisciplinary discussion before surgery. Jo’s account is that those steps were not pushed far enough before a breast came off.

What the Look-Back Has Found So Far

Hunt’s running total is 538 files closed and 321 patients harmed, including one death. Board papers dated 2 September 2026 break that harmed group into grades used for duty of candour.

THE HARM COUNT SO FAR

The papers also list how the harm happened, which is a different cut of the same files, not a second headcount.

HOW THE HARM WAS CODED

• Excessive surgery: 32 cases, including the 20 unnecessary mastectomies.
• Delayed diagnosis: 20 cases, some followed by spread of disease.
• Off best practice: 38 cases, including no immediate reconstruction, surgery on benign disease, and outdated tests such as fine needle aspirate.

A further 283 people sat outside the original search terms and still had to be reviewed. They arrived through the helpline, complaints, other hospitals and the current breast team. By 2 September, 240 of those files had been read; 19, about eight percent, met the legal duty of candour threshold for moderate harm, severe harm or death.

That 283 is the practical argument for going back before 2023. Harm is already sitting in older notes, in people the first trawl would have missed, and in callers who found the trust rather than the other way round. About 640 former patients have used the helpline.

Warnings Sat on the File for a Decade

Board papers say evidence of systemic failings first became clear in 2015. The look-back only began in April 2025, after two external reports and a public apology. In between, reviewers, a cancer alliance, the Royal College of Surgeons and the Care Quality Commission kept putting the same problems on paper.

A DECADE OF WARNINGS

1. 2015: Trust papers now treat this as the year systemic failings in breast services became evident.
2. May 2024: The Northern Cancer Alliance reviews 2023 breast surgery and, in June, reports unnecessary operations and care below national standards.
3. September 2024: A Rapid Quality Review Group is set up with the Integrated Care Board, NHS England and the Care Quality Commission.
4. February 2025: Formal patient safety investigations and duty of candour begin, nine months after the alliance review started.
5. April 2025: After a Royal College of Surgeons report, the trust opens the public look-back of January 2023 to February 2025 care.
6. 23 December 2025: The Care Quality Commission serves a section 29A warning notice on governance, risk and learning from incidents and complaints.
7. 12 June 2026: The regulator downgraded its well-led rating to inadequate, and rated surgery at University Hospital of North Durham, Darlington Memorial Hospital and Bishop Auckland Hospital as requires improvement.

Chris Storton, the commission’s deputy director of hospitals in the north east, said staff had to raise the same issues more than once and described a blame culture in which some people were discouraged from speaking up. Inspectors also found complaints sitting too long, weak control of work sent to outside firms, and families not always told quickly when something had gone wrong.

Staff described a blame culture, and some told us they were actively discouraged from speaking up about concerns, despite the impact these could have on the quality and safety of care.

Chris Storton, deputy director of hospitals in the north east, Care Quality Commission

The trust, which serves about 650,000 people and employs more than 7,500 staff, says the live breast service has been rebuilt. Specialist oncoplastic consultants are in post, every patient is now discussed by a full multidisciplinary team, and old imaging can be pulled up beside new scans. In its June 2026 reply to the regulator it said breast-conserving surgery rates rose to 72% from 53 percent, above the 65 percent bar in the national GIRFT breast surgery programme. Re-excision fell from 25 percent to 12 percent, against a national mark of 17 percent. Immediate reconstruction rose from 14 percent to 33 percent, above 30 percent.

Those numbers describe the service now. They do not shorten the queue of old files. An independent governance review by Mary Aubrey, dated November 2025, recorded the nine-month gap between the alliance findings and duty of candour. That delay is the same shape as the new calendar: harm first, listening later.

Amir Bhatti was the trust’s clinical lead for breast services from 2013 to 2024. A trust spokeswoman has said his clinical practice is restricted while an internal investigation continues, and that the trust is co-operating with Durham Police.

Denise Howarth Was Told After the Surgery

Denise Howarth, 51, of Consett, County Durham, was diagnosed with stage one cancer in her left breast in February 2023. She had a lumpectomy and lymph nodes removed, then was told she still needed a mastectomy, followed by chemotherapy and radiotherapy.

In September 2025 the trust rang her at home to say the mastectomy had not been needed. She is being represented by Hudgell Solicitors. “They called me at home to say I needn’t have had my breast removed and it was something which really knocked me off my feet, I was completely shocked,” she said.

She had already lost two close relatives that year, and her father was very ill, so the recovery had been squeezed into the gaps. The phone call arrived just as she was starting to look forward. “You put your trust in professional people. To be so badly let down is something I’ll never be able to come to terms with.”

On the trust’s apology she was blunt. “An apology is not enough. This is life-changing. I’ve lost so much confidence. I feel robbed of the person I was before.”

Rachel O’Connor, in Hudgell’s medical negligence team, said the firm is advising several women told after the fact that their operations were not needed, and she has called for a public inquiry. “Sadly, at County Durham and Darlington NHS foundation trust, this has not been the case for many years, as deep-rooted, systematic failures have led to women suffering serious harm,” she said.

Durham Police Opened a Crime Portal

Durham Police, assisted by the National Crime Agency’s major crime investigative support unit, is examining whether any criminal offences were committed. Detectives in the major crime team have said the inquiry is still in its early stages and that the trust is supporting it. A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said thoughts were with the women and families affected, and that the department could not comment further on past failings while the investigation is ongoing.

The force opened a portal for people who believe they were victims of crime as a result of breast cancer treatment at the trust between 2023 and 2025. The trust says it is sharing information when asked.

IF YOU HAVE CONCERNS ABOUT YOUR CARE

• Trust helpline: 0191 333 2126, or cddft.breastservices@nhs.net, for anyone worried about their breast care.
• Police portal: Durham Police is taking reports from people who believe 2023 to 2025 treatment amounted to a crime.
• Direct contact: the trust says it will write to patients whose look-back files need a further review, and Hunt told the board some people must be allowed to opt out of that conversation.

Both the trust’s own psychology service and an outside psychotherapy contract have reached full capacity, according to the board papers. The look-back has already cost £523,830 in 2025/26, including £258,653 for a dedicated team of three nurses and one administrator, £177,153 for sessional reviewers, £83,024 for psychology and £45,000 for legal work. A five-year trawl will multiply that bill. It will not put a breast back.

Women Treated in 2015 May Wait Until 2031

At about 80 reviews a month, the widest option is estimated at five years. Board papers warned that notes from before October 2022 are mostly old paper files later scanned, so the older years will be slower, not faster. A woman treated in 2015 could, on that timetable, hear in 2031 whether her operation should have happened.

That is the choice the Integrated Care Board did not want. It is also the choice the trust’s independent Clinical Reference Group was willing to defend. The group has said stretching much further back is “unlikely to identify large numbers of patients requiring further treatment or reveal substantial new clinical learning”.

WHERE EXPERTS DISAGREE

• The Integrated Care Board: wrote on 10 September 2026 asking the trust to open the full 2015 window now, rather than decide year by year.
• The Clinical Reference Group: argues a deep historic trawl is unlikely to find many patients who still need treatment, or much new clinical learning.
• The trust board: backed the phased path, with non-executive director Adam Crampsie among those who raised concerns about moving year on year.

Marshall told the room the clock cannot be turned back. “We can’t turn the clock back as much as we want to do, so we’re trying to be as open and transparent to patients and the public.” Hunt called the method a proportionate, evidence-led clinical approach. Russell said the trust would keep listening and stay open about what it finds.

The 20 women who already have the letter know what the finding sounds like. Howarth’s call came two years after her diagnosis, and it still knocked her over. The next cohort, if the 2015 files are reached at all, will wait a lot longer than that.

For now the live clinic is running to new numbers, the police portal is open, and the look-back will take 2022 next. The women in the public seats asked the board to listen. The calendar they were given runs to 2031.

Disclaimer: This article is news reporting on an NHS look-back, a police inquiry and published harm figures. It is for information only and is not medical, legal or clinical-negligence advice, and it does not assess any individual patient’s care. Anyone worried about past breast treatment should contact the trust helpline or a solicitor who specialises in medical negligence, and should speak to their own doctor or breast-care team before changing any treatment. Figures, ratings and investigation status are those given by the trust, the Care Quality Commission and the police as of 24 September 2026 and may change as reviews and inquiries continue.