Hospital acts after emergency surgery death rate exceeds national average
Rotherham Hospital has introduced changes after the death rate among patients undergoing major emergency abdominal surgery was found to be higher than the national average.
The hospital’s latest board papers state that mortality following emergency laparotomies was 168 per cent higher than the national average in 2024/25.
An emergency laparotomy is a major operation in which surgeons open a patient’s abdomen to treat a potentially life-threatening problem, such as internal bleeding, a blockage, infection or a perforated bowel.
The Rotherham NHS Foundation Trust said 104 patients were included in the national audit covering April 2024 to March 2025. Fourteen of those patients died, equivalent to 13.5 per cent, or around one in seven.
Concerns about the results were added to the trust’s corporate risk register, which is used to monitor significant issues that could affect patients or hospital services.
However, the trust says more recent figures indicate that performance has improved.
Between December 2025 and February 2026, the proportion of patients who died was 6.2 per cent, below a national average of seven per cent.
The newer figures cover a shorter, three-month period, and the trust has not said how many patients or deaths were included in that calculation.
Patients requiring an emergency laparotomy are often seriously ill and may pass through several hospital departments and clinical teams.
The trust said a number of factors could affect their outcome, rather than identifying a single explanation for the higher mortality recorded during 2024/25.
Work carried out since then has included efforts to diagnose patients earlier, changes to their route through the hospital, additional workforce support and closer reviews involving staff from different specialities.
The trust has also changed the way information about patients is handed from one team to another.
Hospital papers referred to plans to appoint a specialist nurse as part of the improvement work. The post has not yet been filled, although recruitment is expected to progress in the coming months.
A trust spokesperson said: “We have undertaken a number of actions across a number of areas which include early diagnosis, patient pathways, workforce support, enhanced multidisciplinary review and changes to handover processes.
“We are committed to using national audit data to improve the quality of care we provide for our patients.”