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The CDC says the hepatitis C outbreak in Nevada may be the "tip of an iceberg" of public health safety concerns.
The city of Las Vegas is still trying to find about 40,000 patients who visited the Endoscopy Center of Southern Nevada from March 2004 until this January and may have contracted hepatitis C.
The clinic license has been suspended, and to be cautious, health officials have suspended the licenses of three other clinics managed by the same group, Desert Shadow Endoscopy Center, Gastroenterology Center of Nevada and Spanish Hills Surgical Center.
Lawyers for the clinics walked into court Monday to try and get their licenses back, but were unsuccessful.
The Encoscopy Center was found not to be using standard public health protocols, and instead was reusing a syringe on the same patient which is apparently the way hepatitis C got into a multi-dose vial of sedative which was then transferred to at least five other patients. The five attended the clinic on the same day for colonoscopies.
Hepatitis C is a blood borne liver disease for which there is no cure. Patients are also being urged to be tested for hepatitis B and HIV.
CDC head Dr. Julie Gerberding called this a "never event" that "should never happen in contemporary health care organizations." But unfortunately she says, they have seen this practice in other large-scale organizations that have led to patient exposure.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-NV met Monday with Dr. Gerberding and in a conference call with the media, both strongly condemned the practice.
Sen. Reid will work with Congress on an emergency spending bill next month to fund more resources for the CDC still trying to locate the 40,000. So far they don't have correct addresses for 1,400 people.
Dr. Gerberding said, "Our concern is that this could represent the tip of an iceberg and we need to be much more aggressive about alerting clinicians about how improper this practice is," she said, "but also continuing to invest in our ability to detect these needles in a haystack at the state level so we recognize when there has been a bad practice and patients can be alerted and tested."
Part of the problem is that about four percent of the population is walking around with hepatitis C already, undetected, undiagnosed and without symptoms. Hepatitis C can destroy the liver for years without symptoms. Fatal liver disease can result as can jaundice and fatigue. Hepatitis B also attacks the liver but is more rare.
Meanwhile, the clinic co-owner Dr. Dipak Desai took out an ad in the Las Vegas Review-Journal Sunday expressing his "deepest sympathy to all our patients and their families for the fear and uncertainty that naturally arises from this situation." He also denied that reusing syringes was part of the protocol at his clinic. He is setting up a foundation to cover testing costs.
So far several civil lawsuits have been filed and criminal charges are being considered by the Clark County District Attorney working alongside the FBI.
Patient George Madden, who got a colonoscopy at the Endoscopy Center can't believe someone didn't speak up.
He tells Las Vegas Now, "Not one person had a heart, or they flat out didn't know what they were doing. Someone knew and we needed a whistle blower." #