Report on death of elderly man in hospital raises hopes of service changes
A report ordered by Tánaiste and Health Minister Mary Harney into the death of Patrick Joe Walsh — a 75-year-old single man from Killanny, Carrickmacross, Co Monaghan — after his death from a bleeding ulcer on October 14 last was presented to the Health Service Executive earlier this week.
Doctors at Monaghan were prevented from performing a simple, life-saving operation on the patient due to restrictions imposed on them by health authorities on the kind of surgery that could be carried out at the hospital.
They had earlier been informed no emergency beds were available for Mr Walsh in any of the nearby hospitals. However, it later emerged that several emergency beds were available in a number of hospitals.
The report, which has yet to be published, is understood to contain serious criticism of the management structures within all three hospitals in the area — Cavan General Hospital, Monaghan General Hospital and Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda.
However, it is also believed to claim that staff at Monaghan General Hospital could have handled the situation differently.
The HSE said yesterday it would not publish the report — carried out by a review team headed by Declan Carey, consultant gastrointestinal surgeon at Belfast City Hospital — until Mr Walsh’s family had time to consider its findings.
It is understood the dead man’s relatives were provided with a copy of the report within the past few days.
The Monaghan Hospital Community Alliance Group yesterday expressed concern that the report mightattempt to blame staff for Mr Walsh’s death.
“It would be very wrong to point the finger at doctors and nurses at Monaghan when the main culprits are the managers of the health services in the north-east,” said the group’s spokesman, Peadar McMahon.
“They are the people who put the systems and protocols in place even though they were told that lives would be lost.”
A HSE spokesperson said a series of recommendations concerning surgical services in Cavan and Monaghan have been implemented since the start of the year, including the presence of a consultant surgeon every weekday at Monaghan General Hospital.
