the protection given by a Bill of Rights and Responsibilities before being operated on, executive director Mr. Hume Martin revealed yesterday.

A Bill of Rights was called for last week by Mr. and Mrs. Eddie Fisher as a result of their son Justin's death at the hospital last January following a routine tonsillectomy.

However, Mr. Martin said the four-year-old's death had not prompted the drawing up of the Bill or the forming last October of the Patient Care Committee.

"It (Bill of Rights) was considered long before Justin's death,'' Mr. Martin said. He claimed the first draft was completed in January this year having been discussed by Bermuda Hospitals Board members during 1991. It could be put into effect by July this year.

At a press conference held last week in the offices of their lawyer Mr. Julian Hall, the Fishers said a Bill of Rights and patients' associations were available in many hospitals overseas and "desperately needed'' here.

Mr. Fisher further pointed out a Bill of Rights was recommended by the Commission of Inquiry into the KEMH Emergency Department after Violetta Carmichael died there in 1983.

Mr. Martin said a Bill of Rights may not have been seen as a priority by those who made up the Hospitals Board at the time.

Explaining the Board members' decision last year to finally act on the recommendation, Mr. Martin said: "It was an idea whose time had come.

"We reached the conclusion a Bill of Rights would be valuable in Bermuda and we are committed to drafting it.'' Patient Care Committee chairwoman Mrs. Kim Young said a Bill of Rights was one of the first things the committee set out to accomplish when it formed.

She said one of the reasons such a Bill had never been drafted before was because KEMH has Canadian accreditation which has never called for the hospital to have a patient's Bill of Rights and Responsibilities.

She said the goal of the Patient Care Committee was to improve patient care at both KEMH and St. Brendan's.

Mr Fisher said a Bill of Rights would have alerted him and his wife Jennifer to their right to employ private nursing care for Justin when he went into hospital.

Justin stopped breathing while unconscious in the recovery room. He was revived and put on life support, but declared brain dead a week later.

Said Mr. Fisher: "What hurts the most is the fact Justin died alone, with the recovery room short-staffed and his mother not allowed in with him or given the option to hire a private duty nurse, the cost of which is $20 an hour ...'' Mr. Martin said he did not yet know exactly what the Bill of Rights and Responsibilities would include, but he said it would cover broader issues like patients' consent, confidentiality rights and the right to know who is treating the patient.

"The Board is actively discussing the Bill and I would hope it would be in place within the next few months,'' he added.

Mr. Fisher said a he believed a patients' association and a Bill of Rights would "help encourage responsibility and accountability at the hospital.'' A Coroner's jury found last month that Justin's death at KEMH was "aggravated by a lack of professional care.'' His nurse in the recovery room was suspended for one week for disobeying recovery room protocol and leaving him completely unattended.

Mr. Martin said the Board had still not made a decision as to whether any other staff members would be disciplined as a result of the jurors' verdict.

At the press conference the Fishers announced that a "frightening catalogue of blunders'' revealed in the inquest had made legal action "inevitable.''