News


Negligence case thrown out by High Court


COURT RULING


The case of a dental patient who claimed he had suffered injuries as a result of alleged negligent treatment by a Tipperary dentist has been dismissed by the High Court.


PJ Molumby, 49, of Thurles, Co Tipperary, sued Liam Tuohy of The Mall, Thurles, following a maxillary extraction on 2 October 2000. In throwing out the case, Mr Justice John Quirke, found that Mr Molumby had failed to establish any negli- gence on the part of the dentist. He also noted that Mr Molumby had a history of tooth extraction and was a heavy smoker before he presented to Mr Tuohy in 1998 complaining of toothache.


Mr Molumby told the court that he noticed his mouth was foul smelling and he suffered significant pain in the area of extraction, bouts of vomiting and head- aches within a week or two after the extraction. However, the judge noted that he was a “poor historian” when it came to recollecting events and showed himself to be incon- sistent and his recollec- tion unreliable and faulty in several respects. Mr Molumby had continuing periodontal disease and had been advised to visit a hygienist, his history of oral hygiene also appeared to have been unsatisfactory, the judge said in his ruling.


12 Ireland’s Dental magazine


| Successful aesthetic restorations p31 | Patient expectations p35 ‘A sea of confusion’. IDA slams lack of investment


HSE underspend is an outrage, says IDA


The Irish Dental Association (IDA) has called the €11.5 million HSE underspend on dental care for medical card patients in 2011 an outrage, calling on the Minister for Health to launch an immediate investigation. The new figures show that the Health Service Executive spent €51.5m on the scheme last year, compared with the figure of €63m that the govern- ment had undertaken to spend. Chief executive of the IDA Fintan Hourihan said: “To withhold spending after providing a totally inadequate budget over the last two years cannot be justified. Last year the number of medical card holders increased by 63,000 but, instead of increasing spending, the HSE decided to underspend by €11.5m. “This means that the HSE


Dublin student misses out on prize


AWARD CEREMONY


A Dublin Dental School student narrowly missed out on picking up a prize at the 35th Anniversary British Dental Association(BDA)/Dentsply Student Clinician Awards, held in London recently.


Fourth-year dental science student Ahmed Sultan


attended the ceremony, which was held at the Royal Horse Guards Hotel at the beginning of February. His poster pres- entation was entitled ‘Do the recently marketed bulk flow- able composites work?’ and was supervised by Dr Garry JP Fleming and Dr Adam Dowling from the materials science unit. And, although he was not


successful in winning a prize on the evening, Ahmed’s research has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Dentistry. The Dublin team, which included fellow classmate Mervyn Hueston, enjoyed the social side of the evening as guests of Dent- sply, the BDA and the Dental Defence Union.


“To withhold spending after providing a totally inadequate budget over the last two years cannot be justified”


spent €28m less on the scheme in 2011 than it did in 2010. To cut a scheme which is already on its knees is a scandal and the Minister for Health has to explain how this occurred.” According to HSE data, 1,304,675 medical card holders are entitled to a free oral exam every year, but only 325,000 took advantage of this benefit in 2011.


Hourihan continued: “The reason for the abysmal take up of the oral exam is due almost entirely to the HSE’s failure to communicate to medical card holders what their entitlements


are. Patients have clearly lost confidence in the HSE’s dental scheme for medical card patients.”


HSE figures also reveal that overall, 450,000 less dental treatments were performed under the medical card scheme during 2011.


“The HSE has consistently ignored our warnings about the effects of turning the medical card scheme into one which only provides emergency care,” said Hourihan. “As a result, the ongoing dental care of up to one million people is being ignored in a sea of confusion.”


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52