‘Lack of senior doctors commonplace’

A SENIOR doctor at the hospital which admitted failing to take proper care of schoolgirl Frances Sheridan before she died has said problems identified in her case are repeated in all accident and emergency departments.

Dr Alan Finan, a consultant paediatrician and secretary of the medical board at Cavan General Hospital where the nine-year-old’s condition was misdiagnosed, said an inadequacy of senior doctors was commonplace throughout the country’s hospitals.

“There is a national issue in relation to A&E generally,” he told RTÉ radio. “A&E is one of the highest risk locations and they are staffed on a 24 hour basis by relatively junior doctors and there is a relatively poor level of supervision because there is insufficient senior staff.”

Frances died on February 1 last, 36 hours after she was sent home from Cavan General where she was diagnosed with a tummy bug despite having had her appendix removed there three weeks earlier and her GP suspecting complications arising from her surgery.

Results of an internal inquiry published this week found the two junior doctors who examined her had no access to her medical files, ignored her GP’s letter and failed to consult with her surgical team or any senior doctor.

The inquiry also found evidence of strained relations and lack of co-operation between junior and some senior staff. Dr Finan said yesterday this was no longer a significant issue.

But Independent Cavan-Monaghan TD Paudge Connolly dismissed the inquiry team’s report as failing to give any reassurance to patients that the mistakes made in Frances’ case could not be repeated.

Mr Connolly said the report simply made only vague recommendations and he was critical of the omission of any reference to the impact on Cavan General of the scaling down of A&E services at neighbouring Monaghan General Hospital.

“They say there has been an increase in the complexity and volume of cases but they don’t say that’s because they took Monaghan off call. That would be going too close to the bone,” he said.

“Nothing in that report would lead me to believe that this could not happen again.”

Mr Connolly also criticised the failure to examine whether bed shortages had anything to do with the junior doctors’ decision not to admit Frances for observation.