IGAS finds half complaints raised by whistleblower intern show “solid signs of violation of leges artis”
The furore caused last year by a young whistleblowing doctor serving her internship at Faro Hospital has seen IGAS, the general inspectorate of health activities, find solid evidence of irregularities in six of 12 cases analysed.
IGAS has opened disciplinary proceedings against two doctors at the hospital – buoying the young doctor who was ostracised following her complaints – but cutting no ice with the hospital itself, which claims it has received professional opinions ‘to the contrary’ – reports that exonerate its professionals from error, explains Sábado – and will be using “legal mechanisms to restore the good name of the hospital and its professionals”.
In other words, the general inspectorate has found faults – as flagged by intern Diana Carvalho Pereira, and recounted by one of the patients’ relatives to tabloid Correio da Manhã – but the hospital board (the Algarve ULS) does not accept them.
For those who have forgotten this story, it centres on complaints lodged by the first year intern at CHUA (the University hospital centre of the Algarve) alleging 11 cases of negligence allegedly practised by her former mentor.
Diana Carvalho Pereira also implicated Faro hospital’s director of surgery, “for collusion”, explains SIC Notícias.
Filing her complaints with all the relevant authorities (PJ judicial police, the General Medical Council, Health Regulatory Authority and central administration of health), Ms Pereira detailed 11 cases that she believed had taken place in the space of just three months – in which three patients died, two were interned in intermediate care, the rest suffered body lesions associated with medical error, including “accidental castration”, the “loss of a kidney” and the “necessity of a colostomy bag for the rest of life.
“One of the patients spent a week with a compress in the abdomen”, the young intern added.
At the time, Ms Pereira’s complaints saw her effectively ostracised from the hospital. She ended up taking time out over the mental exhaustion she had been through.
But her ‘courage’ was congratulated by countless people in messages over social media, including a doctor who wrote an excoriating piece in the local press, essentially saying that whenever he came to the Algarve, he prayed he would not require surgery as he did not want to end up in Faro’s surgical department.
Adding to the ‘drama’ is the fact that IGAS’ conclusions may not have even been fully reported.
According to a copy of the findings, uploaded by Ms Pereira to the ‘X’ social network, the general inspectorate found “solid evidence of violation of leges artis” in six of the cases, and “the other six showed evidence of violation of leges artis” – meaning there could be more to come.
But not according to the hospital board. As reports stress, the Algarve ULS (local health unit) says two inquiries it commissioned have found no errors by the surgeons mentioned in the original complaint, and it thus maintains “full confidence” in them.
Emphasising that the presumption of innocence of those affected must prevail and that ‘hasty judgements’ must be avoided, the hospital board has said it reserves “the right to use all legal mechanisms so that, at the right time, the good name, reputation and credit of this organisation can be restored”, and warns that it will be seeking “consequences from those who may have made unfounded accusations”.
The reports to which the Algarve ULS is referring were both compiled by independent technical-scientific entities within the Order of Physicians. One was a clinical audit by the independent technical-scientific committee of experts of the Order, the other a technical-scientific opinion issued by the board of the General Surgery speciality college
NB. “Leges artis” is the Latin for an intervention being performed in the correct way
