Dr. Ike Okafor:

We had our first set of multidisciplinary assessments. These clinical assessments were purely clinical. They were supposed to assess the current stage of the children to see whether they had any complications or ongoing symptoms. We had a senior physiotherapist who assessed the children using a hip score. The hip score had different components. One was a questionnaire where there is a self-reported outcome while the other assessment involved assessing range and gait and there is a final score that is done. Children who needed to have X-rays went for X-rays and the final piece involved them speaking to the consultant orthopaedic surgeons, all of whom were independent and were not the primary surgeons who saw the children.

The first time we did this was on a Friday and Saturday. We had not anticipated how long it was going to take. We had planned to see 70 children over the two days but some people cancelled while some did not wait. We got slicker on the Saturday. We identified areas on Friday where things did not go right in terms of the flow and we definitely had people home earlier on the Saturday. Generally we were able to capture everything we wanted to capture in terms of the outcomes.

The Deputy is right. In terms of the data, when we see the vast majority of children, we will have an idea of what the complications are. Only then can we quantify what the risk will be to children who received surgery using this type of philosophy or the lower threshold. We started with children who were in the audit. These were children who had surgeries between 2021 and 2023 so they are still relatively young. Where we are going to start to see some of the data in terms of long-term possible complications is when we start to see the older children. It will be good to put it together, publish something and say that, from the number we see, these are the numbers. That will give parents with younger children some kind of idea of what to anticipate or expect.