Medical Missionary nun who introduced cancer screening

Dear sir - In an atmosphere of warranted condemnation of poor clinical standards at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda it is inevitable that the inspiration, toil and prayers of the foundress of the Order of the Medical Missionaries of Mary, Mother Mary Martin, who established the 300-bed state of the art hospital in Drogheda, are lost sight of and collective indebtedness forgotten. The ongoing controversy about how best at this late stage, for potential cancer of the cervix victims, to try to stem the increasing incidence of the disease, provides an opportunity to reveal one of the phenomenally perceptive endeavours that fragile old woman made to improve the care of patients, especially women, in Ireland and the Third World. A case in point never accorded the gratitude it deserves, was her initiative forty five years ago, to introduce cervical screening for cancer to Ireland. Aided by Professor John Kennedy of Galway and the Irish Cancer Society, she set up a screening service at the Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda, while Professor Kennedy put a similar programme in place in Galway which saw in a very few years a dramatic reduction in the incidence of inoperable cervical cancer in the West of Ireland. The ambitious drive to save women from cervical cancer was assisted greatly by sending laboratory technicians to the Chelsea Hospital for Women in London to be educated in the technology needed. Reluctance on the part of successive Irish governments to foster such a vital service for women during the past half century has resulted, undoubtedly, in loss of lives by a disease now being given prominence in our thoughts by the much publicised plight of a female reality TV star who recently died with the disease. But it is also timely to acknowledge that singular endeavour of Mother Mary Martin, foundress of Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, which is a fine physical structure that needs the re-introduction of the discipline and dedication which she inculcated into the ethos of that hospital which can and must be restored. Yours, Austin Darragh, Tarabeg, Hill of Tara.