The Minister for Health and Children, Mr Cowen, has been urged to order an independent investigation into how one of State's major hospitals removed organs from children during post-mortem examinations without parental permission.
In some cases, parents have only recently discovered that children who died 15 years ago had organs removed by medics at Our Lady's Hospital for Sick Children in Crumlin, Dublin. These organs were subsequently incinerated.
Fionnuala and Bernard O'Reilly from Carlow recently learned that, unknown to them and without their permission, the heart and lungs of their baby were removed during a post-mortem in 1994.
Although it was hospital policy to incinerate organs every six to 12 months, their son's organs are still in storage at the hospital. The hospital agreed this week to return the organs to the family for burial.
The parents involved in this and other cases have launched a group to lobby for a full investigation into these practices at Our Lady's Hospital.
They are angry that the organs were removed without their permission, that they were not informed they had been removed, and that the organs were later incinerated without their knowledge.
Our Lady's Hospital defended the practice yesterday, saying that post-mortem examinations were performed to verify the cause of death and to examine the effects of treatment.
"This usually involves the retention of tissue," a hospital statement read. "In certain cases the post-mortem examination is incomplete without the retention and subsequent evaluation of an entire organ.
"This is the universal practice of all pathologists in all hospitals and does not imply the retention of organs for research."
Until the Bristol Royal Infirmary Inquiry last year in Britain, pathologists felt that consent for an autopsy implied consent for retention of such tissues or organs as were necessary to arrive at a satisfactory diagnostic conclusion, Our Lady's Hospital said.
As a result of the Bristol inquiry, the Faculty of Pathology at the Royal College of Physicians in Ireland is undertaking a review of post-mortem practices.
Our Lady's Hospital confirmed that it had revised its post-mortem practices. The new procedures include a consent form which covers the issue of tissue and organ retention.
The Department of Health and Children has established an interdepartmental Coroners Procedures Review Group which will examine the question of tissue and organ retention.
The Fine Gael spokesman on health, Mr Alan Shatter, last night called on the Minister to order an inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the removal of organs at the hospital and to put in place procedural guidelines for carrying out post-mortems.