At 41, Martha hoped a hysterectomy would change her life. It left her traumatised.

'Your body failed. You failed.' That was the story Martha Barnard-Rae told herself as she grappled with complications from a hysterectomy in 2017.

Martha had undergone the operation to address a vaginal and uterine prolapse — a common complication of pregnancy and childbirth. But rather than receive the fix she anticipated, the Western Australian woman was left with a crushed ureter that required emergency corrective surgery.

Three more operations followed over the course of five years, as did a litany of physical and psychological trauma. And through it all, she blamed herself.

Watch: Like Martha, a woman in Oregon sued two doctors and a nurse practitioner over unnecessary hysterectomy. Post continues after video.

"It really did feel like there was something about my body that meant that I couldn't [bring babies into the world] successfully and then continue to have a normal life," Martha told Mamamia.

Then, in 2022, she saw the headlines.

Dr George Campbell Du Toit, the surgeon that performed Martha’s hysterectomy and the subsequent corrective operation at Albany Health Campus, had been banned from practising surgery in Queensland where he worked following his tenure in WA.

Martha read the stories of multiple Queensland women who had come forward with allegations that they had sustained life-altering complications during treatment by Dr Du Toit. Among them, scalpel injuries including damaged bladders and ureters.

With each new account, and each new development, Martha came to feel that it wasn’t her body that had failed her, it was the health system.

The stories. 

Dr George Campbell Du Toit moved to Queensland in late 2020 after his contract at Albany Health Campus was not renewed.

There, he was employed as the director of obstetrics and gynaecology at Mackay Base Hospital on the state’s east coast. He held the position for just 12 months before he was suspended pending an independent review into a string of patient complaints.

That review, which included the period of his tenure, found that "there were clear examples of non-evidence based practice, failures in communication, failures in leadership and a demonstrated lack of accountability" in the hospital’s obstetric and gynaecological services.

More than 170 women came forward to share their stories. The report described some of those stories as "harrowing", and said many featured claims that the women had been "ignored, disrespected, neglected, left in pain and were discharged back to their GP with incomplete resolution of their problems".

The report referred to “failures to thoroughly investigate, or investigate at all, the issues that were arising” with particular reference to the period after October 2020, which is around when Dr Du Toit was installed as department head.

Dr George Du Toit resigned from Mackay Base Hospital and in June 2022 was slapped with a series of conditions by the Queensland Health Ombudsman, including a ban on him practising surgery or treating women during or immediately after childbirth.

After the findings of the review were released publicly in September 2022, Queensland Health Minister Yvette D'Ath offered an emotional public apology to those affected. "I am deeply sorry for the harm that has been caused to you and your family," she said. "Our health system can, and must, do better."

A review into Dr Du Toit’s conduct at Albany Health Campus is now underway, triggered by the findings in Queensland.

Announcing the probe in November 2022, WA Health Minister Amber-Jade Sanderson reassured women that the government was taking the matter "seriously".

"This is the appropriate thing to do, and I would urge anyone with concerns about their treatment to get in touch with [WA Country Health Service] as soon as possible," she said.

"I stood with my dressing gown wide open and demanded someone look at my body."

Martha hopes the review will provide her the answers she’s been seeking about precisely what went wrong in her case.

She has been compelled to advocate for herself ever since complications from her hysterectomy first arose. 

In a letter she sent to the director of medical services at Albany Health Campus, Martha recalled repeatedly raising concerns with hospital staff about a growing bulge in her torso in the days after the operation back in November 2017.

"Since I was trying to be a 'good' patient, I had politely flagged the bulge several times... I was told it was normal to have swelling after surgery. Later, the bulge got red and angry and I spiked a fever.

"In the end I stood with my dressing gown wide open and demanded someone look at my body. Half naked, I gestured to the right side of my torso and said ‘This is what my body looks like,’ then pointed to the distended left side and demanded, 'What is this?'"

"Finally, that got their attention. But it shouldn’t have been necessary."

After further scans, Martha said she was told by Dr Du Toit that her ureter had been damaged during the operation and that she required surgery to repair it. She said she was told the repair involved an abdominal incision, a five centimetre incision in her bladder, and "what equated to a power washing" of her abdominal cavity.

"I didn't really understand what had happened," she said. "I was like, 'Can't you just drain [the bulge]?' And they had to say, 'Well, no. Your abdominal cavity is filled with urine.'

"You have to ask the right questions to really get an understanding of what's going on with your own body, which I think is one of the problems."

Martha recalled looking at Dr Du Toit prior to going under the knife for the second time and thinking, ‘This doctor has potentially made a mistake during this procedure, and I am now expected to trust this same doctor to fix it?’

Martha went on to have three more operations at Albany Health Campus and said she is facing a spectre of possible further surgery, as there signs the prolapse repair is failing.

"I'm probably going to have to have this repair done again, and when I had it done initially, it was a total nightmare," she said.

"It brings up a lot of anxiety."

Martha continues to undergo therapy to address the trauma of her hospital experiences.

"I'm really hard on myself," she said. "I have very high expectations for myself. So I had to really go through some therapy to let go of the idea that this was a personal failure."

Renowned patient advocate, Beryl Crosby, who triggered the review into the issues at Mackay Base Hospital, said many of the patients she’s spoken to have reported suffering psychological trauma from their experience.

"Until you get an investigation, these women are in silo. Some of them didn't complain at all," she told Mamamia. 

"Some thought, 'Oh, well, you know, there's no good complaining.' Some didn't even know that their bad outcome was related [to their treatment]. They’d be in pain and suffering, going to doctors or specialists for a year or so, and then they find out that they've got a nicked bladder, for example."

Beryl is a former patient of surgeon Jayant Patel, who was at the centre of a medical scandal at Bundaberg Base Hospital in Queensland. She has since dedicated her life to advocating for patient safety.

She approached Mackay Base Hospital with concerns about Dr George Du Toit in October 2021 after being contacted by a whistleblower from his department.

Beryl has walked alongside Queensland women throughout the complaints and review process, and she continues to agitate for those who have not received compensation. She said many of the women have come together in online communities to lean on each other through it all.

"It is an awesome thing to see these women supporting each other," she said. "They’re still doing it, still talking about their own issues and saying, 'Yes, that happened to me.'

"It’s empowering."

She’s since been contacted by a small number of Dr Du Toit’s patients at Albany Health Campus in Western Australia and has vowed to do what she can to assist and empower them in their quest for answers.

Beryl is also calling for improvements to the health system that would make it simpler for employers to access a candidate’s history, including their rate of adverse outcomes and any significant volume of complaints against them.

"[Doctors with a history of complaints against them] do move around, and that's the sad fact," she said. "Then they can cause more patient harm everywhere they go. We need a process that is very rigorous that stops that from happening."

In the meantime, both she and Martha encourage women who recognise themselves in her story to speak up, for themselves and for others.

It was knowing she was not alone that compelled Martha to do just that.

"It's very easy to silence or dismiss one person," Martha said. "The only way to force the system to do anything is with a chorus of voices. I’m adding my voice to let other women know that what happened to me is not okay and what happened to you is not okay either. We don't have to put up with this."

Mamamia has approached Dr George Campbell Du Toit for comment through his lawyers.

To learn more about Martha’s experience, in her own words, you can read her piece here.

Feature Image: Jenny Feast.