PATIENTS NOTIFIED Nearly 300 patients have been told they should be screened for infections.

A Massachusetts hospital has notified 293 colonoscopy patients that they might have been exposed to HIV, hepatitis B and hepatitis C, because it failed for almost a year to adequately disinfect colonoscopes, according to news reports.

Baystate Noble Hospital in Westfield, Mass., began using new scopes in June 2012, but staff weren't properly trained on how to disinfect them until April 2013. In the meantime, the water irrigation channels on the scopes weren't sufficiently exposed to high-level disinfection.

Sarah D. Haessler, MD, the hospital's head epidemiologist, says the risk is low, "due to the function of the water irrigation channel and the phase of disinfection at which the failure occurred." But the risk, she adds, "is not zero."

Baystate Noble CEO Ronald Bryant apologized for the situation and says the hospital takes "full responsibility." Patients have been told that they should be screened for infections, which the hospital will do for free.

Jim Burger