TB Scare At Loughlinstown Hospital
Published 19/03/2002

A major TB scare has erupted at St Columcille's Hospital, Loughlinstown, South Dublin. It follows the discovery that a staff member who works in the A&E department has been diagnosed as having tuberculosis. Hospital authorities will not say, for reasons of confidentiality, whether the infected member of staff is a doctor or nurse, or whether he or she was involved in surgery. As a result of the scare, the hospital is recalling patients treated by the staff member to test them for tuberculosis. Doctors and nurses who worked with the infected Healthcare worker are also being screened as they could have been infected also.

TB is highly contagious and while St Columcille's Hospital says that the possibility of infection is extremely low and there is no cause for alarm, public health staff have been offering testing to anyone who may have had 'significant contact' with the staff member. This involves testing anyone who was in 'close conversational contact' with the staff member for eight hours or more. It is understood that so far, no patients or staff at the hospital have tested positive and the authorities are hopeful that this will remain the situation.

However, if others test positive, especially staff, then more widespread screening will be needed. TB is an airborne infectious disease. It is diagnosed from sputum (material coughed up from the respiratory tract) specimens taken from a suspected infected person on three consecutive days. TB is treated with a cocktail of antibiotics. A number of people have died in Ireland with TB in recent years.

 

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