Victims of a medical procedure in which women had their pelvises widened to assist childbirth, have called for an inquiry into why it was performed in Irish hospitals.
The procedure, known as a symphysiotomy, was practised at a number of hospitals in the State between the 1950s and 1980s and has left hundreds of women with serious conditions such as acute back pain, incontinence and depression.
Last week in the Dáil, Sinn Féin called for the Taoiseach to support a public inquiry into the practise and today a lobby group, Survivors of Symphysiotomy (SoS), met with TDs.
Green Party chairman and health spokesperson, Mr John Gormley, told SoS members that the matter would be discussed by the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children on Thursday.
Mr Gormley said: "The harrowing stories from women who have undergone this operation cannot be dismissed or ignored. At the same time we must be prepared to hear the medical profession's side of the story.
"From my meeting with the women from SoS today I know that they are very anxious to come face to face with the doctors and gynaecologists who sanctioned and conducted these operations."
The procedure was performed on women who required a caesarean section to deliver their babies and entailed the patient's pubic bones being sawn in half before, or in some cases, after childbirth. It was intended to prevent the need for further sections in the event of subsequent childbirths.
SoS says many of the women did not consent to the procedure, which they have described as "barbaric". A spokeswoman for SoS told The Irish Timeslast week: "The health authorities don't want to know about this ... We want to know why so many operations were carried out with such disastrous outcomes".
Sinn Féin leader in the Dáil, Mr Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin, said "a very strict Catholic ethos" informed the decision to perform the procedure.
Over 300 women at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda, Co Louth, received the treatment which was also pratised at Holles Street Maternity Hospital and the State's largest maternity and women's hospital, The Coombe.
The Minister for Health is currently examining a report on the procedure by the Institute of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.