Review criticises IBTS
The study by German expert Professor Bernhard Kubanek concludes that differences between the Cork and Dublin centres in informing donors of test results “resulted from more than just different opinions of the two directors of the centres in Cork and Dublin”.
The study was initiated by the IBTS after it emerged during the Finlay Tribunal in 1996 that regional director Dr Joan Power, the whistleblower in the hepatitis C scandal, had delayed in informing a number of donors of their positive diagnosis.
Dr Power has maintained she delayed for two years because she believed the test available in 1991 was insufficiently precise to warrant the risk of upsetting a donor.
In his study, Dr Kubanek described the delay in notification and hence in counselling as “misconceived and inadequate” on Dr Power’s behalf.
He also pointed out that it would have been helpful if the Dublin centre had retested the positive donors with a more advanced test when it came available in 1993.
In his conclusion, he reported that it is “difficult to understand how one Blood Transfusion Service could allow two different approaches to such essential questions following the experience with HIV in transfusion medicine in the late 1980s”.
Dr Kubanek criticised rather tangled reporting relationships between both centres saying, “it should be uniform in the IBTS” and “directed by one responsible person under one quality system”.
His report was presented to the IBTS yesterday and a copy was sent to the Tánaiste and Minister for Health and Children, Mary Harney.
A spokeswoman for the IBTS in Dublin said yesterday it has introduced the most sophisticated testing programmes in recent years and has adopted a single national quality assurance system since the Hepatitis C scandal.
Dr Power was unavailable for comment.
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