An advocate has said the Ministry of Health's pause on using surgical mesh to treat urinary incontinence in women will help build back trust — but there must be more to come.
The move comes after dozens of complaints of injury caused by the product over the past decade as well as a petition urging for the procedure to be stopped.
Female pelvic surgical mesh is used in the treatment of stress urinary incontinence, which is when physical movement puts pressure on the bladder, causing it to leak urine.
Alternative treatments can include surgery without the use of mesh, and non-surgical interventions.
Sally Walker was herself severely injured by the procedure.
She told Breakfast: "I'm very, very happy, very pleased, I'm quite emotional.
"This is going to give [women] back hope, and build up their trust, and just make them believe that it isn't in their heads, which they've been led to believe," she said, adding there is a long road ahead. "I hope this will be the start."
Walker said she was told the product was "the gold standard" when she had her operation.
"As time went on, I wasn't believed, and told it was in my head, and felt sick," she said.
The mesh had gone rotten, Walker said, adding she needed 10 operations.
"I had my bladder removed and that was quite a horrific operation, I nearly lost my life through that," Walker said.
"I've still got mesh inside me, but because I'd had so many operations, my insides were starting to fall out.
"So I had two more operations, and then I had my vagina sown closed, because everything was just dropping out.
"It should never have happened."
The recommendation by the Director-General of Health comes after dozens of complaints over the past decade and a petition earlier this year. (Source: 1News)
Pause expected to last 12 months - health boss
The Ministry of Health's Dr Joe Bourne said the mesh would be reintroduced once certain new measures were in place. (Source: Breakfast)
The Ministry of Health's Dr Joe Bourne told Breakfast the mesh is still safe to use for procedures other than stress urinary incontinence.
"We need to acknowledge the harm that has been caused to many women," he said.
"[However] the mesh remains safe to be used for other procedures. It's really commonly used for hernias, for example.
"We need to make it really clear, we're confident that mesh remains safe to be used for hernias."
Bourne said he's confident the product itself isn't "inherently harmful".
The Health and Disability Commissioner has reported 64 complaints about mesh being used in the surgery in the past 10 years. There is a 3.6% injury rate for procedures involving mesh, based on ACC figures over the past 17 years.
"There's a whole combination of factors that are involved when the operation doesn't go well," he said.
"We've been working for some time now about introducing a number of safeguards.
"But we've got a number of measures that we still need to introduce, and we'll be working towards introducing those over the next 12 months," he said.
Those steps are:
- specific training and certification for surgeons performing the procedure
- creating a registry of all public and private patients who could benefit from it
- reviewing patients and the decision to carry out the procedure with a range of experts from physiotherapists to surgeons
- using a structured and guided informed consent process for patients.
In a statement, Urological Society of Australia and New Zealand female urological advisory group deputy chair Sandra Elmer said the society supported the decision to immediately pause using mesh in surgery in the best interests of patient safety.
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