News Archives

The HSE is set to implement a new incident management policy which will allow for “quick local reviews” in a bid to speed-up examinations of adverse medical events and medical errors. In the aftermath of the Savita Halappanavar tragedy, Savita’s widower Praveen criticised the fact that the team initially appointed to conduct the HSE investigation […]

Amy Lackey, a mother of 2 children who sustained injuries to her neck, shoulder and back when she was travelling as a passenger in the upstairs compartment of a bus when it was rear ended by a vehicle on the Ballyfermot road on 16th April 2008 has been awarded £45,000 in damages by the High […]

The Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI) has advised that it is currently investigating a food poisoning outbreak of the hepatitis A virus associated with the consumption of imported frozen berries.   As a precautionary measure, the FSAI is advising consumers to boil all imported frozen berries for at least 1 minute prior to eating. […]

Research has shown that most medical negligence claims against doctors are the result of drug errors and misdiagnosis, particularly of cancer, heart attacks and meningitis. Researchers analysed 34 studies published over the past two years. In the United States primary care doctors accounted for between 7.6 per cent and 16 per cent of all negligence […]

GlaxoSmithKline, in response to lawsuits brought by 8 U.S. states has agreed to pay hundreds of millions of dollars to settle legal actions over the diabetes drug Avandia (rosiglitazone). The drug maker announced it will pay $229 million and  that the settlement was within the provisions it had set aside for litigation previously. Last year […]

Metal-on-metal hip replacement devices consist of ball and socket components that are made of metal. Because of metal’s durability, metal-on-metal devices were expected to last longer than other hip implants. An estimated 80,000 Irish people have been fitted with metal-on-metal hip implants. Before they came on the market many metal-on-metal hip replacement devices underwent very […]

Hip replacement patients who have received metal-on-metal hip replacement devices may be at risk for serious health problems including cobalt and chromium poisoning, adverse local tissue reactions, pseudotumor formation and metallosis. These conditions can cause a metal-on-metal hip replacement to fail within just a few years of surgery and lead to risky revision surgery to […]

The metal debris shed from metal-on-metal hip implants is thought to be responsible for many of the ailments suffered by metal-on-metal hip replacement patients. If chromium and cobalt are shed by a metal-on-metal device, the particles can leech into the surrounding tissue and blood stream, eventually making their way into the lymph nodes. Research has […]

Health Canada, the government health regulatory agency has issued a safety warning about the risk of blood clots with the drug thalidomide. While uncommon, blood clots in the arteries can happen in patients taking thalomide (thalidomide) especially during the first 5 months of use. Some clots have resulted in death due to heart attack or […]

Louise Barry, a 41 year old employee of Dunnes Stores Clonmel has been awarded €54,600 damages by the High Court for injuries sustained by her in an accident at Dunnes Stores on the 13th October 2004. At that time Ms Barry was employed as a part-time sales assistant and was 6 weeks pregnant. Her job […]