University Medical Center Groningen halts heart defect surgeries after staff complaints
The University Medical Center Groningen (UMCG) has stopped surgeries for congenital heart defects after two staff members raised concerns about social safety and quality of care.
“We take these signals seriously and will have them carefully and independently investigated,” board chairman Ate van der Zee told NOS. Van der Zee declined to detail the complaints, saying only, “It concerns a culture in a department, how people are included in decisions, and such.”
“Highly complex surgeries must take place under the best possible circumstances. At this moment, those circumstances are not fully present,” van der Zee told NOS.
The pause means patients must go to Utrecht, Leiden, Amsterdam, or Rotterdam. Emergency care, outpatient treatments, and routine heart surgeries for adults continue.
According to NOS, one of four pediatric heart surgeons recently left the hospital, though the reason is unclear. A replacement has been found.
UMCG performs about 50 such operations each quarter and hopes to restart no later than Jan. 1, 2026. Van der Zee called the decision “complicated and painful."
