WA doctor Raad Hassan referred to health regulators over death of Perth boy following circumcision

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4 hours ago

A Perth doctor has been referred to the health practitioner watchdog after the "devastating" and "preventable" death of a two-year-old boy following a circumcision.
A coronial inquest found doctor Raad Hassan failed in his professional duty to take the necessary measures to ensure the boy's safety after performing the surgery at his clinic in December 2021.
David Kalunga Flynn was two years and eight months old when he and his eight-month-old brother, Joseph, each underwent the procedure at Gosnells Medical Clinic upon their mother's request.
Dr Hassan performed both surgeries and, as was his usual practice, sedated David with morphine but not Joseph, due to his age.
The boys were sent home with their mother, Alice, a little after 2pm — about an hour after the first surgery was performed.
At the time of discharge, David was still heavily sedated from the morphine and Joseph was suffering increasing pain and bleeding.
Hours later, Mrs Flynn found David unresponsive with his skin cold to the touch.
An ambulance was called and both David and Joseph were taken to Armadale Hospital.
Despite ongoing resuscitation efforts, David was declared dead at 8.03pm that same evening.
While Mrs Flynn was trying to come to terms with that news, she was told Joseph needed to be transferred to Perth Children's Hospital where he underwent emergency surgery to control bleeding from his frenular artery, damaged during the circumcision.
In her report, Coroner Robyn Hartley said David was a happy, healthy child with no pre-existing conditions who never woke from the deep sedation administered for the circumcision.
"David was a much-loved child taken from his family in devastating circumstances," Coroner Hartley wrote.
"He underwent a simple, elective procedure that is generally considered to be safe when performed on healthy children.
"The critical issue in David's case arose out of the administration of sedation in the form of morphine.
"Procedural sedation, particularly in children, comes with significant known risks … [which] can be mitigated if the sedationist complies with requirements aimed at ensuring patient safety."
Coroner Hartley found David ultimately died of a morphine overdose — which could have been identified and rectified if Dr Hassan had conducted the appropriate monitoring during and after the procedure.
"This would very likely have saved his life," she said.
"The three highly qualified medical practitioners who gave expert evidence at the inquest all agreed that, if David had been kept at Gosnells Medical Clinic after the procedure and monitored appropriately prior to discharge, his deterioration would have been identified and reversal of the developing opioid toxicity could have occurred."
"Dr Hassan failed in his professional duty to take the necessary measures to ensure David's safety. His oversights were inadvertent and he has acknowledged his shortfalls and expressed deep remorse for the catastrophic consequences."
The coroner referred Dr Hassan to the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency.
Dr Hassan continues to practice medicine but no longer performs circumcisions and has relinquished access to morphine.
The ABC sent questions to Dr Hassan's practice but did not hear back by the time of publication.
Coroner Hartley said after sitting through two days of very difficult evidence, Mr and Mrs Flynn had been "gracious enough to share an insight into their cherished, cheeky son David".
"While a series of photographs of him with his siblings were shown to the Court, Mrs Flynn told us of the special bond David shared with older sister Casmy, older brother Phillip and younger brother Joseph," she said.
"She also gave us the bittersweet news that David now has a younger sister who he will never meet in this life.
"Mr and Mrs Flynn have been supported through their loss by the Zambian community they know through their church.
Noor Blumer represented the Flynn family at the coronial inquest and spoke to the ABC on their behalf.
She said Mr and Mrs Flynn wanted to share the story of what had happened to David, and their pain over his loss, with the hope it may prevent others from having to go through the same.
"They are a very committed Christian family and they are not the kind of people that are vindictive or out to get anybody," she said.
"I don't think there's a good outcome for them, but I think the best outcome will be if there could be an improvement in practises when making circumcisions available.
"It's really important that circumcision is something that is available to people that want to do it for whatever reasons [religious or otherwise] for their children, in safe circumstances."