Ebola nurse remains in isolation unit after virus relapse

Anton McNulty

THE family of a Scottish nurse who was readmitted to an isolation unit after once again falling ill with the Ebola virus claim doctors ‘missed a big opportunity’ to spot her illness.
Pauline Cafferkey, whose grandfather Anthony was a native of Achill remains in an isolation unit in London after tests indicated the Ebola virus was still present in her body.
Ms Cafferkey contacted the deadly virus last December while working as a volunteer with the charity Save the Children in Sierra Leone and was flown back to the UK. She spent almost a month in isolation in London before recovering and was released from hospital.
Last Tuesday the 39-year-old public health nurse from Glasgow was readmitted to the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in Glasgow after feeling unwell. She was later flown to the Royal Free Hospital in London where she remains in a serious condition in an isolation unit.
Before she was readmitted to hospital, Ms Cafferkey was sent home on Monday by an out-of-hours doctor in Glasgow. Her sister Toni Cafferkey described as the way she was treated as ‘absolutely diabolical’.
“At that point me and my family believe they missed a big opportunity to give the right diagnosis and we feel she was let down. Instead of being taken into hospital, she spent the whole of Tuesday very ill,” she told the Scottish newspaper, Sunday Mail.
“I think it is absolutely diabolical the way she has been treated... We don’t know if the delays diagnosing Pauline have had an adverse effect on her health, but we intend to find out.
“It has not been good enough. We think there have been major failings and we just want her to pull through. This kind of recurrence seems to be rare but we don’t yet know enough about it.”
NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde confirmed that Ms Cafferkey did attend the New Victoria Hospital GP out-of-hours service on Monday.
“Her management and the clinical decisions taken based on the symptoms she was displaying at the time were entirely appropriate. All appropriate infection control procedures were carried out as part of this episode of care,” a spokesperson said.
Ms Cafferkey’s late grandfather, Anthony Cafferkey, was a native of Bunnacurry, Achill, before emigrating to Scotland in his teenage years. Her father, Michael, is a regular visitor to Ireland and was last in Achill two years ago, where he met up with his cousins and relatives.