A final decision on the future of a women’s health department in St George’s Hospital will be pushed back until at least March after criticism by doctors and councillors of a "flawed process".

In the meantime patients are allegedly being treated by some people with "no training whatsoever" who it is claimed need to borrow textbooks from the library.

October 22: St George's Hospital urogynaecology department faced with closure after lead consultant steps down

January 29: Claims 'untrained NHS staff are treating child sex abuse victims using textbooks'

January 31: Patient march to St George's planned against urogynaecology department closure

The urogynaecology department at St George’s in Tooting has been in limbo since June, about a month after the clinical lead stood down.

The proposed closure was debated by Wandsworth councillors in November.

The matter has also been before the scrutiny committees of Sutton and Kingston councils.

Michelle Fynes, a consultant in the department, has been leading calls to keep the unit open.

She told Sutton Council: "I came across a local consultant gynaecologist in the outpatient clinic seeing patients of between seven to 10 years of age in an adult clinic.

"She had no training whatsoever. She had borrowed textbooks from the library the day before to read up. She had an adult assistant with her.

"The children who she was seeing were very much in need of a specialist paediatric service, not a general gynaecologist.

"I had been advised repeatedly that any consultant is sufficient – that they don’t need anyone with specialist training and that is quite frankly wrong."

Dr Fynes has presented her own proposal for the services and identified a clinical lead who could take on a part-time role within the department.

Professor Andrew Rhodes, from St George’s, said: "If we started the consultation again, we would have done it differently.

"We are coming to you [Kingston] very late in the day.

"The consultation is now closed but there are a serious number of suggestions we are working through.

"I do not know what the answer is going to be and we are working through all the options."

Since initial concerns were raised about the consultation, another department, the paediatric and adolescent gynaecology service (PAG), has also come under fire. Dr Fynes also works in this service.

Professor Rhodes assured the committee that no children had come to any harm and there had been no breach of safeguarding issues in the PAG service.

He said any delays in the PAG service were linked to administration and sickness issues and that there had never been an intention to close the PAG.

A St George’s spokeswoman said children "were not part of the transfer of the urogynaecology service [to Croydon] and their care remains at St George’s by appropriately trained medical staff."

A decision is expected to be made by the board of the hospital on March 3.

Merton Council is also due to discuss the matter in February.