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According to Dr Vanessa Martlew, the counselling process at the Mersey & North Wales Regional Transfusion Service for donors found to be carrying an infection was to "gently inform, advise and refer" rather than to provide therapeutic support.

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Catherine Nalty

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Dr Vanessa Martlew conducted HIV lookback exercises in Manchester following the introduction of routine donor screening.

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According to Dr Vanessa Martlew, the Department of Health insisted that, when conducting lookback, the prescribing clinician or the GP must be invited to approach the patient before a clinician from the regional blood centre. However, Dr Martlew recalled that usually both treating hospital clinicians and GPs declined and the transfusion centre consultants would see the recipients.

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According to Professor Marcela Contreras, the North London Blood Transfusion Centre was the first centre to introduce HIV lookback, based in their region. The centre also kept its own list of HIV positive donors.

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Catherine O'Brien told the Inquiry that a search in Wales had failed to identify specific documents relating to an HIV lookback. Documents identified by the Penrose Inquiry suggest a lookback exercise was undertaken in Wales upon the introduction of screening for HIV.

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A diagram was produced setting out the "WBS pre testing HIV Donor Seroconversion look backs".

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Dr John Napier told the Inquiry that the introduction of HIV screening did not have any significant impact on the operation of the Welsh Regional Blood Transfusion Service, as positive donations were exceptionally rare.

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A donor was tested positive for HIV at the Oxford Blood Transfusion Centre. After discussion with her, Dr Colin Entwistle referred her to the GP and to a local haematologist. No lookback was undertaken because Dr Entwistle concluded "her case was very clear cut in identifying the time of infection."

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The Yorkshire Regional Transfusion Centre relied on the blood bank to trace recipients of blood and blood products because hospital records were insufficient for this purpose.

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When computerisation took place at the Yorkshire Regional Transfusion Centre, those donors who had not donated in the past five years were not transferred onto the computer system. Instead, their paper records were archived.

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In his witness statement to the Inquiry, Dr Stanislaw Urbaniak stated that he was not directly involved in the HIV lookback procedure but he noted that for the first four years after testing was introduced they did not have anything to look back on because there were no HIV positive donors identified.

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Dr Chitra Bharucha, consultant clinical haematologist and deputy director of NIBTS from 1981 to 2000, noted there were only two HIV positive donors in that time. In order to maintain confidentiality in a small community, she telephoned the GPs herself.

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Dr Jack Gillon was responsible for HIV Lookback in Edinburgh and South East Scotland Blood Transfusion Service. When a donor tested positive, he was responsible for obtaining the donation records. He wrote to the patient's consultant to inform them that his or her patient had received blood that was possibly infected with HIV, and to offer to inform the patient informally.

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A witness describes how being told of her husband's death nine years after his death provided comfort and that it was nice to know his death was out of her husband's control and "someone else's fault".

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Dr Hewitt explained that the only means of communicating with donors was by letter to the last recorded address held on the blood centre records. There was no facility to trace individuals by other means such as through NHS records.

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The Health Services Management: Retention of Personal Health Records (for possible use in litigation) provided that records had to be kept 8 years after the conclusion of treatment or 8 years after the death of a patient.

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For the record: Managing records in NHS Trusts and health authorities HSC provided that records had to be kept 8 years after conclusion of the treatment or death.

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The Public Records Act 1958, as amended by the Public Records Act 1967, provided that records of NHS organisations are public records.

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Part 1 of the Department of Health Records Management: NHS Code of Practice was released.

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