I thank the Minister for Health, amid his busy schedule, for coming into the House this evening. I am raising a case in respect of which I am aware the Minister has been briefed by the parents of the child who died only last weekend.
I am asking the Minister to instigate an immediate inquiry into the failure by staff at Beaumont Hospital, Dublin, to operate standard international neurological management practices in the case of a child referred to Beaumont Hospital by Wexford General Hospital following a serious head injury which resulted in his death.
I speak of a six year old boy who, tragically, sustained a very serious head/neck injury accidentally at a gate in Barntown in Wexford, an area with which the Minister will be very familiar. When he was brought to Wexford General Hospital a major paediatric head injury was identified and the normal standard neurological practices put into play. As he was not breathing he was immediately ventilated and given mannitol, both practices to reduce the size of the brain and to prevent swelling of the brain.
He was referred immediately to the neurological unit at Beaumont Hospital, Dublin. When he arrived there those on duty and in charge failed to operate what can only be described as standard, international neurological management practices for any serious head injury. It is that which must be questioned and investigated in detail. Those in Beaumont Hospital insisted that he be taken off the ventilator when he arrived, an extraordinary and shocking act given his serious head injury. Despite the protestations of the nurse and those who had accompanied the child by ambulance from Wexford — they even referred them to those in Wexford who had been treating him — those in charge at Beaumont Hospital insisted, went ahead and took the child off the ventilator. Within 24 hours the child's brain had swollen, which would have been expected given the injury he had sustained, and very shortly and tragically he died.
The questionable neurological management practice is what I want the Minister to investigate. The trauma for the parents on losing their six year old boy through this accident is one thing but to have question marks about how their child was subsequently treated compounds their anguish and heartbreak. Apart from this case — tragically nothing can be done for the boy concerned — we must learn all we can about procedures involved because, at present, few people in Wexford General Hospital could refer people to Beaumont with an easy conscience. It is the major concern about other referrals that underlines the urgent need for the immediate investigation and reporting by the Department on this case.
Perhaps this tragic death will have taught us all something about practices. It is a delicate case. I know there is so much only the Minister can say here this evening, but as he knows the case and the people involved I know I can trust him to immediately instigate a report, followed by a medical inquiry, into why standard international neurological management practices were not operated when this serious paediatric head injury case was transferred from Wexford General Hospital to Beaumont Hospital last July.
