What happened? Stained surgical kit debacle to be reviewed by Eastern Health
Health minister cautiously optimistic about elective surgery status
There will be a review into the stained surgical kit debacle that has caused the cancellation of hundreds of operations at the Health Sciences Centre in St. John's over the last number of weeks.
Health Minister John Haggie confirmed Tuesday that Eastern Health will perform an operational review.
"It will be valuable information for other jurisdictions and, indeed, potentially other institutions in this province that may run into similar difficulties," said Haggie in an interview outside the House of Assembly.
"It's standard procedure when you have a code grey or something like this to produce a debrief."
'Two and a half good days'
Haggie is optimistic that problems with the kits have subsided but he wouldn't say the health authority is in the clear just yet.
"Years of caution with things related to hospitals and clinics would suggest that let's just see how the rest of the week pans out," he said.
There weren't any cancellations on Friday or Monday. Haggie said, and none Tuesday prior to his taking a seat in the legislature for question period.
"We've had two and a half good days."
Cause hard to come by
Haggie isn't sure whether the review will find one definitive cause.
He said Halifax and areas in the prairie provinces have also experienced problems with stained surgical kits, and reviews into those problems have been inconclusive.
"They have been unable to identify one particular element that has been the cause," he said.
"What may be the case is there's been a trigger from one end and then that's produced a cascade."
That may explain why there have been two problems with the kits, he said.
Originally, there was staining on the material used to hold the surgical kits. Earlier this month, a black film was found on some of the tools in those kits.
Cost being tallied
Previous estimates put the cost of the fiasco at $3.3 million.
Haggie didn't offer an update on that figure Tuesday.
"I would expect that once the dust settles and the staff have time to do a more full accounting, that figure will be revised," he said.