He claims not to find a sterile scalpel: the doctor operates on the patient with his Swiss army knife

A British surgeon allegedly used his personal Swiss Army knife to operate on a patient (illustrative photo). svitlanah – ENVATO ELEMENTS

A British surgeon allegedly used his personal Swiss Army knife to operate on a patient, according to the BBC. He claims he couldn't find a sterile scalpel.

A surgeon was operating on a patient at the Royal Sussex Hospital in Brighton, England, when he claimed he had trouble finding a scalpel, the BBC reported on October 2, 2024, as reported by 20 minutes. The doctor then used a Swiss Army knife that he usually used to cut fruit for his lunch.

The patient survived, but internal documents show that the surgeon's colleagues found his behavior "questionable" and were "very surprised" that he couldn't find a scalpel.

"This makes me appalled"

University Hospitals Sussex said the operation was an emergency but the surgeon's actions were "outside normal procedures and should not have been necessary", the BBC reported.

"All the equipment should have been there"

Professor Graeme Poston, an expert witness in clinical negligence and a former consultant surgeon, told the BBC: "It surprises and appalls me. Firstly, a penknife is not sterile. Secondly, it is not an operating instrument. And thirdly, all the equipment (had to be) there.”

The BBC also discovered that the same surgeon had performed three so-called low-risk operations in two months, during which all three patients died shortly afterwards.