The Medical Council has said it is concerned about patient safety issues and patient care issues at Cavan General Hospital following its examination of the recently published health board report into the death of a nine-year-old girl three weeks after she underwent an appendix operation at the hospital.
The council discussed the report into the death of Frances Sheridan at its meeting yesterday and decided to assemble a six-person team to visit the hospital, which is run by the North Eastern Health Board, immediately.
Council president Dr John Hillery said the council was "very concerned" as a delegation from the last council visited the hospital in 2001 "made recommendations and had reassurances that their recommendations were going to be followed up on".
"We now as a new council have this report to look at and feel we should quickly ensure that there is no risk to patients that are dependent on that hospital and that the doctors are supported in providing the best possible care to patients who go to that hospital," Dr Hillery said.
"In order to do that, we need to visit the hospital . . . we plan to liaise with the health board to organise a visit before the end of the month, if possible."
Asked if the health board had not implemented the recommendations of the council's previous report, he said the Medical Council would have to meet the health board to discuss that.
"I think in this case the council agrees that there are concerns about patient safety issues and patient care issues and our prime duty is to patients and we will act on that. And if we find that there are still problems, we will talk to the relevant authorities about those problems even if we don't have power within the legislation that we currently act under to do anything ourselves."
Frances Sheridan died last February. The health board report into her death blamed system inadequacies for the staff's failure to identify the fact that her bowel had become obstructed, a complication of her surgery.