Three young Aboriginal men have been hospitalised after a circumcision ceremony went wrong.

The men were admitted to the Tennant Creek hospital on December 30, and spent four days in hospital with severe lacerations.

Jeff Warner from the Anyinginyi Health Aboriginal Corporation says he is disappointed Aboriginal elders did not ensure health staff were present at the ceremony.

He says an Indigenous health worker should have been present.

"[That is] just in case anything goes wrong," Mr Warner said.

"There are problems associated with the materials they use. There could be contamination, that sort of stuff, and we are always on hand providing antibiotics.

"I'm just really disappointed that we weren't informed to be part of it.

"Anyinginyi is the community-controlled Aboriginal health service in the area. We're normally called upon to provide assistance and any frontline stuff that happens on the spot.

"Then we're called out to it, and in fact I think we've always provided a male Aboriginal health worker to the program."

The NT health department says it provides men's ceremonial kits with sterile swabs, scalpels and pain relief, and male health staff are available to attend men's camps during initiations but only with the permission of elders.

A health department spokesman says only one of the men was aged under 18, and the Department of Families and Children has been notified.

He says blood from the men which was on the ground outside the Tennant Creek Hospital's emergency department was cleaned up with appropriate infection control measures.