Cancer patients suffer over hospice probe

TERMINALLY-ILL cancer patients in Galway are being forced to travel to Cork and Dublin for care because a local hospice has refused to take new clients following an alleged drugs mix-up.

The hospice, in Renmore, has not admitted any patients since May 9 when the hospice’s palliative care consultant decided to suspend patient-referrals to the 12-bed unit. Drug administration errors, including four medication mix-ups in one 24-hour period, were behind the consultant’s decision.

The errors included a number of incidents where an intravenous antidote to morphine had to be administered to patients because of a potential threat to their lives.

The allegations were documented in a dossier presented by the consultant to her employer, the Western Health Board, and an independent review of administration procedures is ongoing.

However, the Irish Nurses Organisation, in a statement issued this week, said it was concerned that very ill patients were still being denied access to the Galway hospice. “It is extremely distressing for patients and their families,” INO industrial relations officer Noreen Muldoon said.

“While the organisation welcomes the independent review of medical administration procedures at the hospice, we would like to point out that the day care and home-care services continue to operate as normal and our members are providing a full specialist service to approximately 100 patients.

“We are at a loss to understand why there is a need to cease admissions to the in-patient unit. This is an unprecedented move while an investigation is on-going.”

Meanwhile, a statement from the WHB said the board was “earnestly awaiting” the outcome of the report and it expected that it “would provide the necessary framework for the re-admission of patients to the hospice”.