Thousands Are Warned of Clinic’s Dirty Syringes

[SistahSpeak]

February 28, 2008

Thousands Are Warned of Clinic’s Dirty Syringes

By STEVE FRIESS
LAS VEGAS — Thousands of patients may have been exposed to the hepatitis C virus because of an inappropriate medical practice at an outpatient clinic here over the past four years, state health officials said Wednesday.

After six patients who were anesthetized at the clinic last year were given diagnoses of acute hepatitis C, a Clark County investigation observed that the clinic was not using clean syringes for each injection.

Clinicians giving patients multiple shots of certain medications were using the same syringes to dip back into the vials, allowing for the chance of an infected patient’s virus to contaminate the medication for others, said Brian Labus, senior epidemiologist of the Southern Nevada Health District

The district has sent warnings to all patients at the clinic, the Endoscopy Center of Nevada, who were injected with anesthesia from March 2004 to last Jan. 11, when the problem was discovered. The number was about 40,000.

“It didn’t just happen one time,” Mr. Labus said. “This is the way they did things at the clinic. It’s the way they have always done things.”

The practice was halted when it was found, Mr. Labus said.

Many patients who contract the blood-borne hepatitis C are asymptomatic for many years. The disease can cause lifelong problems, including long-term liver damage without the carriers’ knowledge and early symptoms like jaundice, nausea and fatigue. It is most often transmitted by sharing unclean needles and syringes, Mr. Labus said.

SOURCE: NY TIMES

-------------------------------------------

how does a "professional" make this type of mistake??

[bluesky]

Wow--makes you wonder how many of the could or may have been not only infected with Hep C but contracted HIV/AIDS due to their not using clean needles?

[JamieC]

Wonderful post Sistah. My mother has been an RN for over 40 years and is in the process of retiring this year. She works at one of the local hospitals there in Vegas and you should hear some of the horror stories she tells me from time to time. She's told me on several occassions that although the Docs are on call 24/7 they will go home with their medical garb on and come back to work the next day with the same thing on.

She also mentioned that a lot of them are intoxicated while performing surgery and they make many many mistakes!! That's why she always told me to ask several questions regarding procedures and medical exams. Hell, I'm at the point now where I have the nurse use hand sanatizer before taking my blood pressure and should they need to take blood, I wanna make sure the needle comes from sealed plastic.

[jimihaze]

THis is a great post. thank you for posting it here. There is so much slackness in the medical field until it is down right scary. I see it everyday.