HIV Surgeon Settles after HSE Admission of Screening Failure

by | Feb 2, 2011

A senior surgical registrar, who´s career ended after he contracted the HIV virus from a patient, has settle his claim against the HSE, the State and the hospital in which he worked at the High Court.
The doctor, who cannot be named by court order, is believed to have contracted the virus in 1997 due to a needle stick injury as he performed an operation. Due to the fact that he had performed more than one hundred operations in the three months prior to his diagnosis, he was unable to be specific about the actual patient, but claimed that a lack of screening of hospital patients for HIV had exposed him to a risk of harm.
The doctor further claimed that under the Hippocratic Oath taken by all doctors he had a duty to perform surgery on patients irrespective of their condition; however the HSE did not have a policy of mandatory testing on the grounds that it was uneconomical and that only patients suspected of carrying the virus were asked if they were contaminated. Since contracting his infection, the doctor has had to give up his duties as a senior surgical registrar and suffers all the consequences of having an HIV virus – including tiredness, lethargy and depression. He has undergone therapy to deal with the illness which has substantially altered his lifestyle and prevented the doctor and his wife from having children.
In their defence, the defendants stated that circulars and guidelines were issue to health boards about controlling infection through blood-borne disease and that the doctor had failed to have adequate regard for these guidelines and the risk of HIV infection while carrying out invasive surgery. The HSE denied the claims but admitted contributory negligence. The terms of the settlement were not disclosed.

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