SURGEONS could have avoided removing a patient's one healthy kidney by taking "a few minutes" to read medical notes, the General Medical Council has heard.

Department registrar Mahesh Goel, 41, who previously lived in Burnley, and consultant urologist John Gethin Roberts, 61, were allegedly guilty of "abject, needless and inexcusable" negligence when they carried out the procedure.

Graham Reeves, 69, from Carmarthenshire, South Wales, died five weeks after the botched operation in which his left kidney was removed.

The surgeons were found not guilty of manslaughter under the direction of a Cardiff Crown Court judge in 2002 after a pathologist said he could not be sure Mr Reeves died as a result of the blunder.

But a junior doctor yesterday told the GMC hearing it was "easy" to ensure the correct organ was taken out in January 2000 at the Prince Philip Hospital, Llanelli.

Dr Robert Ley, at the time a houseman and the most junior member of the team, was responsible for seeing Mr Reeves at a pre-operation clinic to ensure he was fit to undergo an operation.

He also obtained Mr Reeves' consent for the removal of the right kidney in December 1999.

The operation had been scrapped then because there was no bed available in intensive care.

Dr Ley said he wrote a discharge letter noting the planned operation which was kept on file and would be "fairly easy to find" when the patient returned for his operation.

He said patients about to go into theatre had their medical notes and any relevant do cuments on a separate trolley ready to accompany them.

But on the morning of the operation he did not recall any discussion about which side the the operation was going to be on.

The hearing has been told that Goel, who later took up a post at Burnley General Hospital, performed the surgery.

He admits that after the first cancellation of the operation he entered in the department diary that the left kidney, rather than the right, was to be removed.

Goel, who is not at the hearing but is in India, denies being incompetent and unprofessional and denies he was guilty of serious professional misconduct.

The hearing continues.