Garden remembers organ scandal babies

Both the QMC and the City Hospital admit keeping organs

A memorial garden has opened in Nottinghamshire for families whose dead children's body parts were removed without their consent.

It is being funded by hospitals at the centre of the retained organs scandal.

More than 1,000 parents have been invited to the special ceremony at Woodthorpe Park by Nottingham City Hospital and the Queen's Medical Centre.

It is an apology after both hospitals revealed they had kept patient's organs between 1970 and 1999.

Thrown away

Julie Whittaker lost her nine-month-old daughter in 1990.

She found out 11 years later that her heart and brain had been removed and thrown away.

She told the BBC: "All of us need to work towards a better future for everybody within the NHS trust.

"We've got to do that for the sake of our other children.

Public apology

"We want them to grow up and fully trust in doctors and nurses and everybody that treats them, that they are telling them the truth."

It is hoped the garden will provide a special place for reflection.

Sue Cumming, a Chaplain at the QMC said: "We hope that it will bring closure.

"We hope that now this will be a point at which people can put behind them the last two or three years and have a place to go to again remember that loved one."

The gardens with a stream, statute and flowers will serve primarily as a remembrance to the children but will be open to anyone who has lost someone close to them.