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No children infected from sterilisation failure at hospital


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26/08/2007 - A review of sterilisation practices at the Canberra Hospital has revealed that no patients were infected with HIV or hepatitis due to poor sterilisation of equipment.

The external review followed revelations that two of four paediatric rectal suction biopsy tools at the hospital had been cleaned but not sterilised in accordance with current Australian Sterilisation Standards.

The discovery prompted ACT Health to contact more than 100 former patients, who when they were babies may have been infected with hepatitis B, hepatitis C or HIV when they had a colon biopsy between February 1987 and mid-October last year.

But an interim report of the review tabled on Thursday, found that there was no evidence that any of the children were infected as a result of using the tools.

ACT Health Minister Katy Gallagher says sterilising practices at the hospital are of a high standard.

"I want to reassure the ACT community that, while the incident that led to this review should never have happened, overall sterilising and infection control services at Canberra Hospital are of a high standard," Gallagher said in a statement.

While the review found that appropriate actions were under way at the hospital to reduce the chance of similar problems occurring in future, it made a number of recommendations to improve current practices.

The report recommended the tracking system of surgical equipment be improved, to ensure that there is a comprehensive electronic tracking of all reusable instrumentation.

The report also called for the improvement of governance structures involving ACT Health sterilising services.

Gallagher said the recommendations were being implemented.

"ACT Health has developed an action plan in response to the review's recommendations that is currently being implemented," she said.

"It is important to reiterate that the infection control performances of ACT public hospitals compare favourably with hospitals in other states and territories, and are, for example, lower than major hospitals in other capital cities, such as Melbourne and Sydney.

"The independent review team will consider the findings of this audit and present a final report later this year."

Source: AAP NewsWire

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