Beyond belief

If you want the dignity that comes with sex-segregated spaces, prepare to die for it.

In one of the most shocking stories yet, a London hospital has cancelled a woman's life-saving operation at the last minute because it doesn't 'share her values'. That 'value' she had was that she wanted the aftercare nurses to be female.

Former solicitor Teresa needs urgent, rare and highly complex, colorectal surgery. She selected the private Princess Grace Hospital, which specialises in women's healthcare, for it specifically because she didn't want to be in a mixed-sex facility.

A victim of sexual assaults, Teresa made it clear to the hospital how important this issue was to her, by both requesting a single-sex room and bathroom, and stating she would only answer questions on forms about her sex, not her 'gender identity'.

During a pre-operation intimate procedure, a male member of staff, wearing a blonde wig and bright lipstick, opened the door uninvited, and peered in. He made eye contact with her, before leaving. Teresa wondered if she was being targeted due to her requests

Feeling frightened and vulnerable, Teresa reported the incident as a 'patient dignity breach', and issued a request that her nursing care from now on must be from females only, and not men who 'ID' as women, something that is allowed under the Equality Act

She then had to go home for three days to prepare for the operation, in which pre-op medication was to be couriered to her. Nothing arrived. She called the hospital and was told the operation had been cancelled, with no explanation given why.

She then found an email had been sent to her by the CEO of the hospital saying the operation, which was due the next working day, had been cancelled due to a 'lack of shared values' and to 'protect staff from unacceptable distress'

The life-saving operation would have involved two leading surgeons, their clinical entourage, two surgery suites, a robot, a place in ICU and a patient bed for seven nights, and this was all cancelled at the last minute.

The hospital CEO also, in contravention of healthcare regulations, failed to confirm that she would register the patient dignity breach and did not offer to investigate it.

With the operation cancelled, probably the only alternative available to her at this, now, late stage, is open surgery, something her surgeon did not recommend as the best option.

Just four days after the operation was due to take place, last week, her condition began to deteriorate and Teresa ended up in A&E, in considerable pain. She has rapidly lost weight and may now be too weak to have the open surgery.

As she says: "The material reality of my serious illness is being totally disregarded by Princess Grace Hospital in order to protect the feelings of a male member of staff who committed a breach of patient dignity".