(SF)

NEW YORK -- New York health officials said about 630 patients of a Long Island physician who reused vials may be at risk for HIV and hepatitis B and C.

Nassau County Executive Tom Suozzi identified the doctor in the investigation as Harvey S. Finkelstein. Suozzi said that despite the New York State Health Department's refusal to name the doctor, "the public has a right to know."

Health Warning After L.I. Doctor Reuses Vials


Finkelstein, an anesthesiologist, has not been found guilty of any violations. He is, however, subject to three years of state and county "monitoring" as a result of the state investigation.

It was initially reported that the doctor was reusing needles and syringes, but it turned out that he was actually reusing vials that he attached to needles, officials said.

The danger in reusing vials lies in drawing blood when an injection is made. Some of the patient's blood can flow into the vial, and then be injected into another patient if the vial is reused.

At least two of the patients of the unidentified Nassau County physician have already contracted hepatitis C, an inflammation of the liver caused by a virus, officials said.

The officials said Tuesday that the at-risk patients were notified by letters sent in the mail last week after a three-year investigation was concluded.

The vials were reused between 2000 and 2005, officials said.

Officials have known about the two hepatitis C infections for about 18 months.

Prior to the identification of Finkelstein, state health department spokeswoman Claudia Hutton said the he could not be identified because of rules set by the state's disciplinary board for doctors.

__________________
Put me on wheels and I'll turn tricks.

Clever? Nah, I ran out of that years ago. But if you find this, let me know, k?
"The road goes ever on..." ~ Tolkien

In memory of my friend skip...
Go then, there are other worlds than these

Well, we all know how expensive sterile vials are, huh?


Someone please forgive me for thinking he's a vile person.

__________________
Though I am different from you,
We were born involved in one another.

For it was not into my ear you whispered, but into my heart. It was not my lips you kissed, but my soul.

Complete surrender should not just come at moments in which one faces overwhelming odds, but in the calm when it seems one is personally in complete control of one's life.

When I first read this I was having a lot of "Day After" problems, headaches ate., so I ignored it, because I couldn't make sense of it.
We (Nurses) use multi- dose vials all the time, though they are disappearing. If you use a different, (clean or new) needle and syringe each time there is no danger.
What he actually did (as reported last night) was change the needles without changing syringes, which is dangerous. If you pull back while injecting you can draw blood into the syringe, contaminating it.

Two things. How could he not know this, especially for many if not most injections, you have to pull back to see if you are in a blood vessel or not.
(some meds MUST NOT be injected into a vessel, some MUST be, either way, you pull back.)
If these were meds given IV during surgery, the injection port is very high on the tubing, and it would be almost impossible for blood or viral infections to be drawn the 2 to 4 feet upward, against liquid flow and gravity, to contaminate the syringe, but you still have diluted the med with the IV fluid.

This is all very odd.

He also has a lot of past charges of malpractice.



WW

__________________
"I wondered, am I a lesbian, am I straight, or bisexual? Then I realized that I am just a slut.
So where's MY parade?"

---Margaret Cho