Galway: A reply has been sought next week by the Health Information and Quality Authority from Galway University Hospital and the Health Service Executive (HSE) that proper standards of safe care were adhered to while treating Savita Halappanvar. Watch: India to take up issue with Ireland l Protest outside Irish Parliament
“The HSE’s investigation into Ms Halappanavar’s death will be led by its director of quality and patients’ safety, Dr Philip Crowley, Minister for Health James Reilly said yesterday. An expert in obstetrics and gynaecology from Northern Ireland has been approached to be a member of the investigating team,” according to a report published in www.irishtimes.com
Dr Reilly said he didn’t want to see either investigation – the HSE’s one or the hospital’s internal one – delayed one minute longer than necessary or to leave Ms Halappanavar’s family in doubt. He was due to receive a report on two further maternal deaths that occurred this year in an Irish hospital, the report added.
“Dr CVR Prasad, a consultant at Merlin Park Hospital in Galway and a close friend of the Halappanavar family, has called for an independent inquiry into Savita’s death, the report further said.
Pat Rabbitte, Minister for Communications, also said there was an urgency about bringing clarity to the law in the area of abortion.
Halappanavar, 31, died in Ireland due to blood poisoning after doctors allegedly refused to terminate her 17-week-long pregnancy, telling her that "this is a Catholic country".
Savita's husband Praveen Halappanavar, an engineer at Boston Scientific in Galway, told Irish media that his wife had asked several times over a three-day period that the pregnancy be terminated.
This was refused, he said, because the foetal heartbeat was still present and they were told "this is a Catholic country".
(With inputs from Agencies)
Watch: India to take up issue with Ireland l Protest outside Irish Parliament
Read: Public probe sought in death of Indian woman
