Chief executives of the former health boards may be called before a Dáil committee to explain why they did not begin to implement guidelines on preventing the spread of MRSA 10 years ago.
The Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health was urged yesterday to call the chief executives before it by Clare TD James Breen, who contracted MRSA and lost full power in his right arm. He made the plea following presentations to the committee by support group MRSA and Families.
Dr Teresa Graham, one of the group's Waterford members whose late husband contracted the antibiotic-resistant superbug while in hospital, said former health minister Michael Noonan presided at the publication of guidelines on the care of patients with MRSA in 1995 but they were left to gather dust. Had they been implemented much of the suffering in the intervening 10 years would have been prevented.
Kilkenny GP Dr Ronan Fawsitt said the 1995 guidelines directed that GPs be sent letters by hospitals when MRSA patients were being discharged but such letters were not sent. At that time there were 55 cases of MRSA bloodstream infections reported every year. Now there were more than 500 a year.
He also claimed bed linen could be bought which was more suitable for preventing the spread of MRSA but it was not because it cost €2 more.
Margaret Dawson, who said her husband Joe had picked up MRSA at a Dublin hospital, said his doctor never told them he had MRSA. "Instead he told us that Joe's infection was down to the fact that he was a smoker and had arthritis." Committee chairman John Maloney said they would decide soon whether to ask former health board chief executives to appear before it.