HSE accepts failure in clinical judgement as a cause for Savita death

The Health Service Executive said they fully accept that a failure in clinical judgement caused the death of Savita Halappanavar.

The HSE said they welcome the findings of a HIQA report which identified 13 missed opportunities to detect her deterioration.

The body said that all recommendations in the report will be implemented across the country's 19 maternity hospitals.

"We not only accept them but we welcome them," said Dr Philip Crowley, national director of quality and patient safety with the HSE.

"I have to express sympathy today to the Halappanavar family and to Praveen on what is an ongoing and difficult saga for them arising out the failure of care for Savita

"We called HIQA in to do this investigation we wanted a statutory investigation as you will be aware we did our own but this puts the investigation and the recommendations on a statutory basis."

The Taoiseach said he will give full consideration to the report, which lays down a challenge to the HSE.

Meanwhile, the father-in-law of Tania McCabe, the young woman who died during childbirth in 2007, said if recommendations were followed since her death, Savita Halappanavar would still be alive today.

Garda McCabe was pregnant with twins at the time and died after her membranes ruptured at Our Lady Of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda. One of her children survived.

Safety standards in maternity hospitals have been questioned following the latest HIQA report into the death of Savita, which also criticised the failure to learn lessons after Tania McCabe's death.

The Health Minister James Reilly has also expressed concern about the similarities between Savita's death and the death of Garda McCabe, saying lessons have not been learned since then.

Her father-in-law Phillip said it "is reasonable to assume" that if recommendations were followed through, Savita's outcome would have been different.