A SURGEON yesterday admitted that he did not spell out how much risk a keyhole surgery operation held for a pensioner.

Mr Cyril Hutchinson, 68, died after surgeon Nigel Harris accidentally cut a blood vessel while the pensioner was undergoing a gall bladder operation, a double fatal accident inquiry heard.

Mr Hutchinson, of Standburn, Stirlingshire, who had a history of heart disease, died on the morning of November 4, 1997, when he suffered a heart attack after attempts to stop bleeding in his stomach.

The inquiry at Falkirk Sheriff Court heard Mr Harris then started working his way through the other seven patients on his operating list for that day.

One of them, Mrs Isobel Hunter, 58, of Larbert, Stirlingshire, who had a hiatus hernia operation, died six hours after Mr Hutchinson.

Mr Harris, 46, a consultant surgeon at Falkirk Royal for the past 10 years, told the inquiry that during keyhole surgery on Mr Hutchinson he was trying to dissect the gall bladder from the liver using a probe.

''I hit bleeding. I got bleeding from a blood vessel.

''In dissecting the gall bladder from the liver, I obviously hit a blood vessel and bleeding started,'' he added.

The surgeon immediately stopped keyhole surgery and opened up Mr Hutchinson. It took five minutes to contain the bleeding, during which the patient lost 2.1litres of blood.

Fifty-five minutes after the start of the operation, he closed up Mr Hutchinson and the recovery process began on the operating table.

The anaesthetist was about to waken the pensioner when he had a heart attack. He was pronounced dead at 10.45 am.

Mr Harris told the inquiry that he did not warn Mr Hutchinson - who had a history of heart trouble, had undergone a quadruple heart by-pass and complained of angina - or his family, that he would be at ''increased risk'' during surgery.

He said Mr Hutchinson was the first patient he had lost during routine surgery.

Professor Sir Alfred Cushieri, of Ninewells Hospital, Dundee, said in a report that Mr Hutchinson died from a heart attack precipitated by ''substantial blood loss''. He added that he did not recommend keyhole surgery for patients who had a history of heart problems.

His report stated: ''In my view, the patient was a very high risk.''

The inquiry continues.