New South Wales Health is advising patients of a Sydney cosmetic clinic to get tested for blood borne viruses. Fresh Cosmetic Clinic formerly located on George Street in the Sydney CBD was found to have breached infection controls potentially exposing clients to viruses such as hepatitis and HIV.
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TVTranscript
00:00Well, that's something we don't have a good handle on, Joe,
00:05as there were not good records at the clinic
00:08that were able to identify the exact number of clients
00:12and exact procedures they had.
00:14So that's one of the reasons that we're going out public with the alerts
00:18so that the clients who have been there
00:20can assess whether they had the kinds of procedures that were risky
00:24and, if so, go to their GP for testing.
00:26And is it clients over a particular timeframe
00:29or just anyone who visited this particular clinic?
00:32Again, there's not a lot of certainty we have
00:35when these procedures may have been done in an unsafe way
00:40without proper infection control.
00:42We believe that the clinic was there for about two years,
00:46but there's not good business records or any client records
00:50that really help us to know for sure about the time period at risk.
00:55And can you go into any detail for us at all
00:58on how infection controls were breached?
01:03Yes. Well, there were some devices there that penetrate the skin,
01:07such as used for dermabrasion.
01:10So there's little metal spikes that run across the skin.
01:15They're meant to be just used on one patient and discarded,
01:19but we have found evidence they were used on multiple.
01:23We also found that vials of injectable medication
01:29may have been used on more than one patient and that client,
01:33and that gives the opportunity,
01:36when multiple drawing out of the same vial,
01:39to spread a virus from the bloodstream of one person to another.
01:44Is it shocking for you to hear that this sort of thing is happening?
01:48Yeah, it's very worrying that this kind of procedures
01:53are happening in our community,
01:55and I think the clients don't really understand
01:58what measures should be in place to protect them.
02:01And what should clients of this clinic do now?
02:04Well, if they're a client and they had an injection
02:09or any kind of surgical procedure or an implant,
02:12we're asking them to go to their GP and ask for testing for hepatitis B,
02:17hepatitis C and HIV.
02:20And if they have complaints about any procedures
02:27or any encounters there,
02:29the Healthcare Complaints Commission would like to hear from them.
02:33And if clients want to understand a bit more
02:37and understand if they are at risk of blood-borne viruses,
02:40they're welcome to call the local public health unit
02:43and we can give a letter to take to the GP if that's helpful.
02:46Are you aware of any clients
02:48who have actually picked up infections from this?
02:52Thankfully, there's not been anyone
02:54who's been shown to have these infections.
02:56We're aware of other complications, like acute complications.
03:00These blood-borne viruses are longer-term infections
03:05and they can be silent for many years,
03:07so that's why it's important to get tested.
03:10Even if the initial procedure seemed to go without any trouble,
03:14that doesn't mean that there wasn't a risk of exposure
03:16to blood-borne viruses.
03:18And, yeah, it's always disturbing to hear these kind of cases.
03:21What can clients do to try to minimise the chance
03:25that the clinic they're going to,
03:27if they choose to have these procedures,
03:30is doing the...
03:31..yeah, to ensure that they're getting the right treatment?
03:34Hmm.
03:35Well, any kind of injection needs to be prescribed
03:38by a registered health practitioner
03:42and any procedure with implanting,
03:47any cosmetic procedure,
03:49it should be a registered doctor, a registered nurse
03:52that is doing the work.
03:54So that's the first thing to check
03:56and if there's any suspicion
03:58that the practitioners aren't fully qualified,
04:01then checking in with the Australian Health Practitioner
04:05Regulatory Authority that you can check online
04:07if a person is registered
04:09or, again, contact the Healthcare Complaints Commission
04:12about any concerns that whether a person
04:16that's doing these kind of procedures
04:18is registered and trained to do them.