An additional seven hospitals have confirmed that they had taken glands without consent during post-mortem examinations on patients and supplied them to pharmaceutical companies during post-mortems to pharmaceutical firms
The latest hospitals to confirm their involvement in the practice, which now seems to have been widespread up to the mid-1980s, are the Children's University Hospital in Temple Street; the National Maternity Hospital; Sligo General Hospital; Letterkenny General Hospital; the Mid Western Regional Hospital in Limerick; the Midland Regional Hospital Mullingar and Galway's University College Hospital.
The chief executive of Temple Street Hospital, Mr Paul Cunniffe, confirmed to The Irish Times that 246 pituitary glands had been collected at Temple Street between 1979 and 1985.
He said the hospital identified in October 2000 which children had their pituitary glands removed and informed their parents, if their parents had already sought information on their child's post-mortem.
However, he said parents who had not contacted the hospital to inquire about post-mortems on their children were not contacted. "We decided to respect the decision of families who decided not to contact us."
Mr Cunniffe also confirmed the hospital operated "a routine system whereby human material retained from post-mortems was dealt with by incineration" before January 2000.
"We did not specifically send organs for incineration as a result of the announcement of the Dunne inquiry."
The issue of organ-retention without consent has been known about for up to five years but was reignited on Friday when Our Lady's Hospital for Sick Children in Crumlin, Dublin, said new information came to light which enabled it to contact parents of children whose pituitary glands had been given by it to the predecessor of Pharmacia Ireland, KabiVitrum, for the manufacture of human growth hormone.
Since then the Coombe Women's Hospital; Cork University Hospital; Tralee General Hospital and two former Dublin hospitals, the Richmond and Jervis Street, have admitted they also supplied the glands to pharmaceutical companies.
In a more detailed statement yesterday, the Southern Health Board said its hospitals in Cork and Tralee had supplied "without remuneration" pituitary glands to both KabiVitrum and another pharmaceutical company, Novo Nordisk, which is expected to issue a statement today.
The Cork hospital gave about 75 glands and Tralee gave approximately 36. The health board has been unable to identify the patients concerned.
The Western Health Board said UCHG also supplied pituitary glands to KabiVitrum but did not have records of the number of glands collected or monies paid.
"A small honorarium was given to the histopathology department at the end of the year. This was used to purchase pathology textbooks." It said consent was obtained in some cases.
The North Western Health Board confirmed the practice occurred in Sligo and Letterkenny between 1981 and 1985. It has been unable to identify the patients involved. "Direct reimbursement of the hospitals did occur and all sums received were used to defray costs," it said.
The Midland Health Board said it supplied KabiVitrum with pituitary glands from 1981 to 1985. They were harvested at its hospital in Mullingar. "The company involved provided the freezer which was used to store the glands at the hospital prior to collection and no other financial transactions were involved."
The Mid Western Health Board said it supplied pituitary glands to KabiVitrum in the late 70s and early 80s.
"We understand the company paid a small sum in respect of each gland to the pathologist and that this money was used for textbooks and continuing medical education."
All said the practice was engaged in in the interests of children with growth hormone deficiency and it ceased in or about 1986 when artificial growth hormones became available.
Dr Declan Keane, master of the National Maternity Hospital, said only a small number of pituitary glands were harvested there and there was no financial reward for the hospital.