A Government TD has spoken in the Dáil of his family’s personal experience with the consultant under investigation for the implanting of unapproved springs into three children during spinal surgery.
Fine Gael Wicklow-Wexford TD Brian Brennan said he has two children aged seven and six. His young son has cystic fibrosis and was called to see the consultant under investigation, he said.
“We met the consultant. He told us literally straight away that my son needed surgery. I asked straight away, like any parent would ask, ‘what are the pluses and what are the minuses’.”
“He explained about them. I said, ‘leave the decision with us’ ... I told my wife we’re not going ahead."
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Mr Brennan said his son had already been through enough with his cystic fibrosis.
“So I am a lucky parent, but my heart – and I’m emotional on this – my heart goes out to every other parent who has been affected.”
“How someone can stand there and look a child in the eyes and say, ‘we need to do surgery on you’ when it’s not needed,” Mr Brennan asked
“It’s simply horrific. It’s unfair, I’m upset, but I’m also annoyed,” he said. appealing to the Dáil “to let justice take its course”.
He was speaking during a debate on the surgeries in which Minister for Health Jennifer Carroll MacNeill offered her “deepest regret for the distress and anxiety caused to the families”. The HSE and CHI (Children’s Health Ireland) have apologised to the children and families affected by these issues, she said.
She said children were “failed in process, duty and responsibility”.
“We must confront this failure openly, honestly and with a determination to make sure it does not happen again and to regain trust.”
The Minister said a Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) report into the use of unauthorised springs in spinal surgeries was a “stark reminder of what happens when safeguards fail”. The report found that springs implanted in surgeries between 2020 and 2022 were not CE-marked and that the controls in place “did not provide adequate safeguards at each stage of the process”.
She said “what happened to the children involved was wrong ... should not have been allowed to happen.” The chair of the board has resigned and a new chairperson is expected to be appointed “in the coming weeks”.
She added: “I assure everyone here and outside of this House that I am totally committed to dealing with these issues.”
The HSE’s chief executive and his team are regularly meeting the CHI’s chief executive to ensure the 19 HIQA recommendations “are being implemented without delay”.
Sinn Féin health spokesman David Cullinane said “the story of CHI has been a sorry saga of dysfunction and crisis.
A separate audit is continuing into hip dysplasia amid reports that 561 children were recalled after claims that surgeries were carried out unnecessarily and in some cases children did not have the condition at all.
Mr Cullinane said parents of children who had surgeries “don’t know if the osteotomies were needed or not and are still in the dark”. Many people got a second opinion and were told their child did not have the condition or need the surgery.
The procedure involves cutting into the child’s bone “so it’s a really invasive surgery”. He said “there has to be accountability” in CHI and very similar issues happened concerning surgeries for children with scoliosis and spina bifida. “It’s the same people, it’s the same culture, it’s the same failures.”
The Minister said she had not received the audit report into hip dysplasia and could not verify the details Sinn Féin had based on media reports that 60 per cent of surgeries at Temple Street were not indicated, 79 per cent at Cappagh were not indicated, and 2 per cent at Crumlin were not indicated.
She pledged to publish the audit when she received it and to hold a debate in the Dáil.
