Muftah Sam Eljamel is a Libyan surgeon who was head of Neurosurgery at Ninewells Hospital in Dundee, Scotland and Professor of Neuroscience at Dundee University from 1995 until 2013. He was suspended in 2013 following accusations of medical malpractice. A public inquiry into his conduct ordered by the Scottish government commenced in November 2025.
Eljamel is of Libyan nationality and is thought to have qualified as a doctor at Al Fateh University in Tripoli. [1] [2] He worked at the Walton Centre, a major neurology hospital in Liverpool, from September 1987 to August 1991. [3]
From October 1991 to April 1995 he was employed as Senior Neurosurgical Registrar at Beaumont Hospital in Dublin, Republic of Ireland. Eljamel claimed to have completed a fellowship in Clinical Neurosurgery at Hartford Hospital and the University of Connecticut Health Centre in 1995, however this was denied by Hartford Hospital. [4] [5] He also claimed to be a visiting professor at the University of Connecticut and the University of San Diego, which both universities denied. [4]
He took up his post as head of Neurosurgery at Ninewells Hospital and Professor at Dundee University in 1995. [4] He also operated on private patients at Fernbrae Hospital in Dundee, which closed in 2019. [4] [2] . He was described as "one of Scotland's most respected surgeons. [2]
Concerns were raised by whistle-blowers as early as 2009 that he was harming patients. [6] Eljamel was regularly away from the hospital doing private work when he was meant to be operating on patients and leaving junior surgeons to operate unsupervised. [6] He has been accused of serial malpractice including botched and unnecessary operations, with as many as 200 patients harmed by him. [4] [7]
He was placed under supervision in June 2013 and an investigation was opened by the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. He was suspended in December of that year following publication of their final report. [4] An internal NHS Tayside due diligence review later criticised NHS Tayside management for putting him under indirect supervision rather than suspending him in the first instance. [8] [9]
He resigned from his positions at NHS Tayside, Dundee University and Fernbrae Hospital in May 2014 and, rather than facing a medical tribunal, was allowed to voluntarily remove himself from the medical register in 2015. [2] [4] [10] [11] [12]
Eljamel established an office in Berlin, Connecticut, US in 2015, describing himself as an expert in General Neurosurgery, Stereotactic and Functional Neurosurgery. [13] [14]
Despite having been removed from the medical register, Eljamel was invited to chair a session at a Royal Society of Medicine conference in 2016. The organisers retracted their invitation after being made aware of his background. [15] In 2016 he was subject to a probe by Liverpool University for claiming to hold the position of Professor in their Department of Neuroscience despite having no involvement with the university since achieving his doctorate in 1992. [16] In 2017 he was ordered to remove claims on his personal website that he was registered with the General Medical Council. [17]
Eljamel left Scotland in 2018. [18] The extent of the malpractice allegations became public knowledge later in 2018 with the televising of a BBC Scotland Disclosure documentary. [4] This led to the opening of an investigation by Police Scotland. [19] [20] [21]
In 2020 it was revealed that Eljamel was practicing surgery at Al-Nahda Hospital in Misrata, Libya. [22] [23] [24]
Patients who had been operated on by Eljamel sued NHS Tayside for compensation. This included one patient being awarded compensation £2.8 million. [25] Judge Lord Uist later ruled that Eljamel was liable to pay the full £2.8 million. [26] [27]
In 2022 an internal Scottish Government report stated that NHS Tayside repeatedly let patients down with failures in the way Eljamel was supervised and in their communication with patients. [28] In 2024 the Lord Advocate, the principle legal adviser of the Scottish Government and the Crown in Scotland, criticised the pace of the seven year police investigation. [29]
In April 2023, then Minister for Public Health Michael Matheson launched an independent review of NHS Tayside in relation to Eljamel. [30] A public inquiry was announced in September of that year, to be headed by Judge Lord Weir. [31] [32] Matheson stated that Eljamel should be brought to account and that extradition could be an option as the Scottish government has extradition procedures in place with Libya. [33]
The public inquiry opened in November 2025, [34] hearing evidence that NHS Tayside had destroyed 40 operating theatre logbooks covering the period Eljamel had practised at Ninewells Hospital, despite a "do not destroy" order being in place, which was described by the inquiry's senior counsel, Jamie Dawson KC, as a potential breach of the Inquiries Act 2005. [35]