Three more hospitals have come forward today to admit they retained dead children's pituitary glands and supplied them to unnamed pharmaceutical companies.
It has also been reported this evening that a Danish-based pharmaceutical firm, Novo-Nordisk, was supplied with pituitary glands by no fewer than 32 Irish hospitals over a 10-year period. The company confirmed this to RTÉ news.
Ardkeen hospital in Waterford, Louth County Hospital in Dundalk and Our Lady's Hospital in Navan, Co Meath all admitted the practice today.
In a statement, released to ireland.comon request, the South Eastern Health Board confirmed that Ardkeen Hospital passed approximately 50 glands to a pharmaceutical company between 1978 and 1984.
The statement said: "As part of the Dunne Post Mortem Inquiry the South Eastern Health Board carried out an audit of post mortem records. During this audit no records were found of the transfer of pituitary glands to any company or agency.
"However, recent correspondence from a pharmaceutical company indicates that they received glands from Ardkeen Hospital from 1978 to 1984. This correspondence has indicated over the six years that approximately 50 glands were forwarded to the pharmaceutical company for the manufacture of human growth hormone. We are unable to match this information with post mortems relating to any individual.
It continued: "The South Eastern Health Board has been co-operating fully with the Dunne inquiry and has furnished the inquiry with all information in our possession.
"The South Eastern Health Board acknowledges and regrets the distress this has caused to families of relatives."
It also said it wished to reassure people that practices today around informed consent and record retention had changed and that the practices of almost 30 years ago "would not occur in today's services".
A confidential freephone helpline has been established for families who have any concerns or queries in relation to organ retention, the SEHB said.
The number is 1800 300655. It is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday to Friday.
The hospital is the eighth in the past two days to admit to retaining organs that were subsequently passed to pharmaceutical families. Our Lady's Hospital for Sick Children last week became the first to admit its involvement in retaining pituitary glands.
Other hospitals that have also confirmed they took glands without consent include the Coombe Women's Hospital, the Children's University Hospital in Temple Street, Dublin, the National Maternity Hospital (Holles Street), Sligo General Hospital, Letterkenny General Hospital, the Mid-Western Regional Hospital Mullingar and University College Hospital Galway.
ireland.comis still awaiting a statement from the North Eastern Health Board in relation to the Navan and Dundalk hospitals. ireland.comhas also contacted Novo-Nordisk for comment.