Perinatal Death Due to Negligence Exposed by RTE Program

by | Feb 3, 2014

An RTE Prime Time program has exposed four cases of perinatal death due to negligence at the Midland Regional Hospital in Portlaoise.

The program “Fatal Failures” featured the tale of Roisin and Mark Molloy from Tullamore in County Offaly, whose son Mark died soon after his delivery January 24th 2012. The couple fought a four-month battle to have an investigation launched into their son´s death – during which time they were fed misinformation into the circumstances of his delivery.

When an independent clinical review was subsequently concluded, it reported that “failures in the standard of care provided were casually linked to the foetal hypoxia damage that occurred [and the death of baby Mark]” – effectively that Mark had suffered an avoidable perinatal death due to negligence.

The Midland Regional Hospital issued the Molloy´s with an apology and told the couple that neonatal deaths at the hospital were extremely rare. However, by chance, Roisin Molloy heard a radio interview in which a Shauna Keyes was retelling the story of how she had lost her child at the Midland General Hospital in similar circumstances, and the two women got in touch with each other.

However, as the RTE Investigation Unit discovered, there were at least two further incidents of perinatal death due to negligence, which had been investigated internally at the hospital, but the grieving parents never been advised of the outcome. The RTE investigators also found that none of the measures that had been recommended following Mark Molloy´s death had been implemented.

Appearing in the program, Dr Philip Crowley – the National Director of Quality & Patient Safety at the Health Service Executive (HSE) – said that the delays in investigating Mark Molloy´s death and implementing procedures that would avoid perinatal death due to negligence were “lamentable” and he apologised on behalf of the HSE for the trauma the families had been through.

The Minister for Health – Dr James Reilly – also commented on the findings of the RTE investigators. Speaking on the Today radio program he said he had asked the Chief Medical Officer to conduct a further investigation into the failings of care at the hospital and described the four cases of perinatal death due to negligence as “utterly unacceptable”.

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