Harney seeks to reassure mothers over miscarriage scan errors

Health Minister Mary Harney tonight insisted the country remained one of the safest places in the world to have a baby, despite revelations of a number of misdiagnosed miscarriage cases.

The minister said she had spent the last couple of days putting right obstetric services, amid fears errors on scans could have affected hundreds of women.

About a dozen mothers have come forward this week warning they were wrongly told they had miscarried, only to give birth later to healthy infants.

As the Health Service Executive (HSE) launched a review of all recorded cases of wrongly diagnosed miscarriage over the past five years, Ms Harney said she wanted women to have faith in the system.

“I clearly would like to express my sympathy and my support and my solidarity with the women that have come forward this week and had such a traumatic experience both for themselves and for their families,” she said.

“My concentration over the last number of days has been to ensure that we put right, insofar as we can, our obstetric services around the country and that we have standardised practice both in the public and the private sector.”

The minister defended herself for not publicly addressing the issue sooner.

“Just because I haven’t been in a TV or radio studio does not mean that I have not been working hard to put these things right,” she said.

“There are an awful lot of people who are pregnant – 80,000 a year – and we want to make sure that these women have confidence in our system.

“It is one of the safest places in the world to have a baby and that remains a fact.”

As part of the HSE review experts will be checking results for those recommended drug or surgical treatment to remove a dead foetus despite having a viable pregnancy.

Dr Barry White, HSE national director for quality and clinical care, said misdiagnoses which came to light this week were unacceptable.

“In a number of the cases discussed in the media in recent days the practices were unacceptable and this reinforces the need to implement standardised care across the system and to ensure compliance with this by audit and review.”

Earlier this week the HSE said they had stepped up precautionary measures after a pregnant woman was wrongly told her unborn baby was dead.

Medics arranged for Melissa Redmond, from Donabate, north Dublin, to take abortive drugs and have an operation to remove the foetus after a faulty scan misdiagnosed a miscarriage.

But she said her motherly instincts prompted her to seek out a second opinion just a day before the dilation and curettage (D&C) procedure was planned in a move that saved her now 13-week-old baby boy.

HSE bosses said they had taken a number of measures at Drogheda’s Our Lady Of Lourdes Hospital to ensure there was no repeat of the “near-miss incident”.

Mother-of-three Melissa, who had suffered miscarriages before, went to Our Lady Of Lourdes Hospital for a scan while eight weeks into her pregnancy on July 22 last year.

After the scan she was told the pregnancy would not progress and was administered with the abortive drug Cytotec to take on the morning of the D&C operation to remove the foetus, scheduled for two days later.

But after getting morning sickness again at her friend’s home the next day, Melissa decided to get a second opinion from a local GP.

Melissa gave birth to her baby boy, Michael, on March 6 this year.

The HSE confirmed the faulty scanner continued to be used for six months after the misdiagnosis.

Opposition parties Fine Gael and Labour have demanded an investigation by the Health Information Quality Authority.