A BRITISH transplant surgeon testifying for the family of a woman who died after donating a kidney to her husband refused to be cowed in cross-examination yesterday, noting how the operating surgeons' testimonies did not gel with the autopsy findings.

When challenged that he could not prove her surgeons had used too many surgical clips, Professor Michael Nicholson from the University of Leceister, retorted via video-conferencing that it was impossible to prove now that they had not.

The number of polymer clips the surgeons used to clamp Madam Narindar Kaur's renal artery to stop it from bleeding is one of the key issues raised in the medical negligence suit brought by her family against the two surgeons and the National University Hospital.

The forensic pathologist who conducted the autopsy had found four identical clips near the open end of her renal artery and concluded she had bled to death when they slipped.

Madam Kaur died on Feb 16, 2005 while she was recovering in a hospital ward from surgery to donate a kidney to her husband.

Prof Nicholson's opinion is that the surgeons were wrong to have used four clips on her renal artery, which could have created such intense pressure that they slipped post-surgery.

But the two surgeons, Dr Li Man Kay and Dr David Consigliere, insisted that they had used only the standard two clips on the artery.

Their explanation for the autopsy findings was that they had used smaller clips on the side vessels and the pathologist had failed to notice that the clips were of different sizes.

Yesterday, their lawyer, Mr Edwin Tong, put these points forward to Prof Nicholson.

But Prof Nicholson said that it was not his practice, nor that of surgeons in other countries, to clamp the smaller blood vessels.

Read the full report in Saturday's edition of The Straits Times.