The Minister for Health, Mr Martin, has promised women whose wombs were unnecessarily removed by the former Drogheda obstetrician Dr Michael Neary that their suffering will be inquired into in a fair and expeditious manner. Eithne Donnellan, Health Correspondent, reports.
A number of Dr Neary's victims, who are represented by the Patient Focus support group, met Mr Martin for over two hours at the Department of Health in Dublin yesterday where they pushed for a statutory public inquiry into what happened them. The meeting was described by the women as constructive and Mr Martin has promised to meet them again in three weeks.
One of the affected women, Ms Fidelma Geraghty, made a brief statement on behalf of the group after the meeting. She said: "We had a constructive meeting with the Minister. We have put forward our necessity for a public inquiry. We will meet with the Minister again this day three weeks when he has assured us he will present us with concrete proposals as to how we will progress with this inquiry."
She added that the womens' main priority was to find out why what happened to them happened and "why it was allowed continue for so long".
Dr Neary operated on the women at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda, where he practised from 1974 to 1998. It was in late 1998, after the womb of a 20-year-old woman was removed within minutes of her giving birth to her first baby, that Dr Neary's practices were outed by two midwives.
The North Eastern Health Board, which had taken over the hospital from the Medical Missionaries of Mary the previous year, began investigating. So too did the Medical Council. Its Fitness to Practice Committee recently found Dr Neary guilty of professional misconduct and struck him off the medical register.
After yesterday's meeting, Mr Martin reiterated his shock at the findings of the Medical Council's investigation. "The report was a dreadful indictment of the treatment of the women concerned who have been both physically and emotionally scarred," he said.
He said it was clear after listening to the women that a further inquiry was required into a number of wider issues such as how such practices were allowed continue for such a long period of time at the hospital. He discussed with the group various forms of inquiry and said he would be bringing a detailed submission to Government within weeks.