A blood product given to a haemophilia patient when safer products were available was probably issued because it was nearing its sell-by date, the tribunal heard yesterday.
The factor-9 clotting agent, given to a man with the pseudonym Luke during a minor dental procedure, infected him with hepatitis C. It was dry-heat treated and made by the Blood Transfusion Service Board.
Mr Paul Lynam, chief technologist at the St James's Hospital blood transfusion unit, said the product was issued first to another patient in 1989, who returned it unused to the hospital. By this time a newer factor9 product was in use.
Counsel for the tribunal, Mr John Finlay SC, asked Mr Lynam if he had been directed to quarantine the BTSB factor-9 when the newer product became available. Mr Lynam said no such directive was issued.
Counsel put it to him that Prof Ian Temperley, former director of the National Haemophilia Treatment Centre (NHTC), had issued an instruction in June 1990 that from the following month the transfusion unit should not order dry-heat treated factor-8. Mr Lynam said the directive referred to factor-8 only. The BTSB product was issued to Luke in October 1990.
Earlier, concluding her evidence, Ms Eadaoin O'Shea, the nursing sister in charge of haemophilia patients at the NHTC in the 1990s, said at the time people "sneered" at the idea of young men being counselled.