The Minister for Health has asked for a full report from the South Eastern Health Board on how a patient at Waterford Regional Hospital could have contracted Legionnaires' Disease in the hospital and died from it, writes Eithne Donnellan.
The patient, a woman in her 60s, was being treated in the hospital for an underlying "chronic medical condition" when she contracted the disease. It was diagnosed last week and she died on Sunday.
"Immediate indications are that the patient acquired the infection in the hospital, having regard to the time the patient was in the hospital and the incubation period for the disease. The circumstances of the case are being fully examined," a health board spokeswoman said.
A team from the hospital including consultant microbiologists, infection control staff and representatives of nursing technical, laboratory and management staff has been assembled to investigate what happened.
Dr Mary Hickey, a consultant microbiologist at the hospital, said the woman had been in an en-suite room for a number of weeks and the inquiry was focusing on whether or not she could have picked up the disease from the water supply in her en-suite. Samples taken from the room, which was now cordoned off, were examined and the results were awaited.
She said the disease was not transmitted through person-to-person contact and there was no reason to believe this was anything other than an isolated case.
"All the indications are that this was an isolated incident and we have put a full range of measures in place to allow me to assure people that there is no reason to be alarmed," Dr Hickey said.
The group of bacteria which cause Legionnaires' Disease, which has a fatality rate of up to 15 per cent, are commonly found in stagnant water. Just 28 cases were reported to the National Disease Surveillance Centre (NDSC) in the 10-year period to 2001, but the NDSC states in its annual report that this suggests "a major degree of under-diagnosis and under-reporting".
A case was being treated in the Eastern region in March, but since the public health doctors' dispute began, up-to-date figures on new cases are not available. The SEHB said it had not treated any other cases this year.
The health board in a statement said: "The board took immediate steps within the area where the patient was located to remove the risk of further infection to patients or staff. Due to patient confidentiality, the board cannot comment on individual patient cases."
Last night the Labour Party health spokeswoman, Ms Liz McManus, said the woman's death was "a matter of serious concern requiring urgent action from the authorities".
She said: "The indications that the woman contracted the disease in Waterford Regional Hospital itself are a matter of particular concern. People who go to hospital for treatment for one condition should not find themselves at risk from other infection."
See also page 7